Quality of life of undergraduate nursing students

A descriptive cross-sectional study with 206 students conducted in July 2013, in the city of Picos/PI, Brazil. Data were collected using the WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire. The Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used to analyse the data with a significance level of 5%.

Results

The domains with the best average scores were Physical (69.4) and Social Relations (74.3), and the domains with the worst average scores were Psychological (68.5) and Environment (54.2). For the overall assessment, the average was 66.6+10.8. A statistical significance was observed when crossing QOL with number of children (p = 0.029), where students without children performed better.

Conclusion

These results allow the early detection of difficulties experienced by nursing students and may support strategies that benefit the search for solutions to conflicts that affect QOL.

Quality of life; Students, nursing; Health evaluation

Domains	Average±SD	Minimum	Maximum
Domain I – Physical	69.4±14.3	25.0	100.0
Domain II – Psychological	68.5±11.9	37.5	95.8
Domain III – Social Relationships	74.3±15.7	25.0	100.0
Domain IV – Environment	54.2±13.4	3.1	96.9
Overall Assessment	66.6±10.8	32.5	93.9

Variables	Overall QOL Assessment

	Average ± SD	p-value
Current semester		0.110*
I – II – III	64.6±10.7
IV – V – VI	66.8±10.3
VI – VIII – IX	68.7±11.1
Sex		0.418**
Female	66.2±11.1
Male	68.1±9.7
Age		0.748*
18 – 21	66.6±9.7
22 – 25	67.0±11.2
≥ 26	64.7±15.4
Colour (self-referred)		0.187*
White	67.2±10.5
Black	71.9±11.8
Asian	61.6±9.0
Brown	65.7±10.8
Work status		0.099*
Studies only	66.9±10.7
Studies and formal employment	69.8±8.4
Studies and informal employment	60.5±12.4
Income		0.916*
< 1 minimum wage	65.5±11.7
1 – 3 minimum wages	66.5±10.9
> 3 minimum wages	67.3±10.4
Economic class		0.587*
A1 – A2	63.4±7.7
B1 – B2	67.8±9.6
C1 – C2	65.9±12.0
D – E	66.2±10.0
Marital status		0.166*
Married/Consensual union	64.6±11.2
Single	67.0±10.5
Separated	47.9±21.7
Number of children		0.029*
Zero	67.2±10.7
One	65.4±7.7
Two or more	56.1±12.7
Hometown		0.444**
Picos – PI	66.0±11.4
Other localities	66.9±10.5
Living with		0.947*
Parents	66.8±11.1
Family members	67.1±11.3
Friends	67.0±9.7
Partner	66.7±12.1
Alone	62.0±12.4
Physical activity		0.841**
Active	66.9±10.1
Sedentary	66.5±11.0
Smoking		0.943*
Daily smoker	65.5
Occasional smoker	65.7±8.9
Non-smoker	66.7±11.0
Drinking		0.160*
Zone I	67.0±10.9
Zone II	62.1±8.2
Zone III	66.0±9.4

Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul. Escola de Enfermagem Rua São Manoel, 963 -Campus da Saúde , 90.620-110 - Porto Alegre - RS - Brasil, Fone: (55 51) 3308-5242 / Fax: (55 51) 3308-5436 - Porto Alegre - RS - Brazil
E-mail: revista@enf.ufrgs.br

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[1] Corresponding author: Ana Roberta Vilarouca da Silva. E-mail: robertavilarouca@yahoo.com.br