Study of Effects of Dao-In Exercise on the Perimenopausal Women With Sleep Disturbance

Among health problems of peri-menopausal women, sleep disturbances is very common complaint. The aim of this study is to realize the body constitution of the peri-menopausal women with sleep disturbance; and to evaluate the effects of Duo-in practice on this population to see if this intervention can decrease the dosage of hormone replacement therapy.

Quasi-experimental design and convenient sampling are both adopted. Participants will be recruited from China Medical University, Tri-Service General Hospital, Taiwan Society of Health Promotion, and Dr. Chen's Obstetrics and Gynecology Clinic. One hundred of participants who are willing to try Duo-in exercise to improve their sleep quality will be randomly assigned into experiment group and control group. The experiment group will practice Duo-in exercise 20 minutes every day for 2 months; while there is no intervention in the control group. Then, after 2 weeks, the participants of experiment and control group will crossover. The experiment group has no intervention, but the control group will practice Duo-in exercise for 2 months. Chinese version of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (CPSQI), Body Constitution Questionnaire (BCQ), peri-menopausal disturbance scale, and peri-menopausal fatigue scale will be used in the assessment at each time point. According to previous experience, a total of 70 participants will completed the whole observation course. Generalized estimating equations (GEE) is applied to analyzed the repeated measurement of different time and groups.

This study will provide the evidence for Duo-in exercise as complementary treatment for hormone replacement therapy for peri-menopausal women, and also for integration of Dao-in exercise into mainstream treatment for other patients with sleep disturbance.