fa عمومى General پژوهشي Research <p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Background:</strong> Aging has a growing trend in the world. The elderly experience a high incidence&nbsp;of hospitalization and coronary bypass surgery compared with other age groups, and pain is the&nbsp;most common complaint in these patients. This research was conducted to compare the effect&nbsp;of acupressure and cryotherapy on the pain of removing drain tube from the chest of the elderly&nbsp;who have undergone open heart surgery.<br> <strong>Methods:</strong> In this quasi-experimental clinincal trial, 150 elderly people undergoing coronary&nbsp;artery bypass grafting with drain tube in their chests and hospitalized in the Intensive Care Unit&nbsp;of Shahid Rajaei Hospital (affiliated to Alborz University of Medical Sciences and Health and&nbsp;Treatment Services, Tehran, Iran) were selected through random sampling method. Then, they&nbsp;were divided into 3 groups of acupressure, cryotherapy, and control. The acupressure group&nbsp;received pressure on ST36, P6, LI4 points. The cryotherapy group received cold therapy through&nbsp;applying three packs of cooling gel, and the control group received routine postoperative cares.&nbsp;The pain intensity was measured 20 minutes before the insertion of the tube, during insertion, and&nbsp;10 minutes after removal of the drain tube. The tools for collecting data were abbreviated mental&nbsp;test form, demographic questionnaire, and visual analoge scale. The obtained data were analyzed&nbsp;through descriptive and inferential statistics by SPSS version 20.<br> <strong>Results:</strong> In terms of demographic characteristics, the patients were homogenous. Before the&nbsp;intervention, there were no significant differences among three groups in terms of pain intensity&nbsp;(P=0.93). However, after the intervention, pain intensity, immediately after, and 10 minutes&nbsp;after removal of chest tube, significantly reduced in the experimental groups compared with the&nbsp;control group (P˂0.001). In general, reduction of pain intensity was higher in the acupressure&nbsp;group compared with the other two groups (P˂0.001).<br> <strong>Conclusion:</strong> Applying acupressure on ST36, LI4, and P6 points is effective in reducing the&nbsp;intensity of pain caused by removal of drain tube from the chest of the elderly patients. It is&nbsp;recommended as a safe and inexpensive drug-free approach to control pain caused by the&nbsp;removal of drain tube.</p> Ageing, Chest tube, Pain, Acupressure, Cold therapy (Cryotherapy) 37 52 http://jccnc.iums.ac.ir/browse.php?a_code=A-10-167-6&slc_lang=fa&sid=1 Farideh Bastani 10031947532846003290 10031947532846003290 No Department of Geriatric Nursing, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Sakineh Hajizadeh sakineh@yahoo.com 10031947532846003291 10031947532846003291 Yes Department of Geriatric Nursing, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Kiarash Sa`atchi 10031947532846003292 10031947532846003292 No Faculty of Traditional Medicine, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Hamid Haghani 10031947532846003293 10031947532846003293 No Department of Biostatistics, Faculty of Health, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.