Quality of life of master’s and doctoral students in health

this is a cross-sectional study carried out with 503 master’s and doctoral students from the Brazilian Center-West, using the WHOQOL-BREF to analyze their quality of life. Analysis included Cronbach’s alpha coefficient, confirmatory factor analysis and bivariate and multivariate analyzes.

Results:

older age and having a child were associated with higher average quality of life scores, while diagnosis of anxiety/depression, difficulty in managing academic and personal activities and thinking about dropping out of course were associated with lower average scores in quality of life domains (p <0.05).

Conclusions:

master’s and doctoral students have reduced quality of life during the entire training period, mainly in psychological and physical health. The management of academic activities and dropping out of course are the main variables associated with decreased students’ quality of life.

Descriptors:
Quality of Life; Education; Graduate; Students; Mental Health; Health Occupations

Domains	Physical health^* * Confirmatory factor analysis, factor loading	Psychological^* * Confirmatory factor analysis, factor loading	Social relationships^* * Confirmatory factor analysis, factor loading	Environment^* * Confirmatory factor analysis, factor loading
Items
03. Pain and discomfort	0.484
04. Dependence on medicinal substances and medical aids	0.397
10. Energy and fatigue	0.756
15. Mobility	0.462
16. Sleep and rest	0.542
17. Activities of daily living	0.770
18. Work capacity	0.715
05. Positive feelings		0.634
06. Spirituality/religion/personal beliefs		0.593
07. Thinking, learning, memory and concentration		0.530
11. Bodily image and appearance		0.562
19. Self-esteem		0.796
26. Negative feelings		0.535
20. Personal relationships			0.738
21. Sexual activity			0.555
22. Social support			0.525
08. Physical safety and security				0.705
09. Physical environment: (pollution/noise/traffic/climate)				0.512
12. Financial resources				0.595
13. New information and skills				0.456
14. Recreation and leisure				0.624
23. Home environment				0.504
24. Health and social care				0.454
25. Transport				0.443

Quality of life domains	Ano acadêmico
Quality of life domains	Ano 1	Ano 2	Ano 3 ou mais	F	**P^ * One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.***
Physical health
Master's degree	64.4±18.1	65.7±16.4	65.7±16.1	0.167	0.846
Doctoral degree	61.0±15.1	66.1±16.1	67.0±15.8	1.795	0.169
Psychological
Master's degree	58.6±17.0	58.8±17.2	62.2±15.1	1.300	0.274
Doctoral degree	60.7±15.7	62.6±16.7	64.0±15.8	0.557	0.574
Social relationships
Master's degree	61.8±18.7	60.2±19.9	62.2±18.8	0.208	0.812
Doctoral degree	57.8±18.2	63.1±20.4	61.4±19.1	0.763	0.467
Environment
Master's degree	60.9±15.2	62.5±14.7	63.7±13.3	0.728	0.484
Doctoral degree	65.2±16.7	63.1±15.8	64.5±14.4	0.300	0.741

Variables	n (%)	Quality of life domains
		Physical health	Psychological	Social relationships	Environment
		Mean±SD	Mean±SD	Mean±SD	Mean±SD
Sex
Female	411(81.7)	64.8 ± 16.5^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;	60.6±16.3	61.7±19.0	63.2±14.7
Male	92(18.3)	69.3±15.1	63.5±16.9	60.1±18.6	63.6±15.1
Children or dependents under 18 years old
Yes	124(24.7)	66.8±16.1	64.9±16.0^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;	58.9±19.2	65.0±13.6
No	379(75.3)	65.2±16.4	59.6±16.4	62.2±19.2	62.7±15.0
Anxiety and/or depression
Yes	164(32.6)	59.0±16.6^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;	53.6±17.2^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;	57.0±20.6^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;	60.4±15.6^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;
No	339(67.4)	68.8±15.2	64.8±14.8	63.5±18.2	64.6±14.1
Difficulty in reconciling graduate school with personal life
Often	233(46.3)	58.6±16.2^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	54.9±16.4^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	53.9±19.5^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	58.8±14.7^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.
Sometimes	185(36.8)	69.2±14.0	64.5±14.4	65.0±15.9	65.6±12.7
Never	85(16.9)	77.1±12.0	70.9±13.6^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	73.8±16.6	70.3±14.9
Relationship with supervisor
Dissatisfied	51(10.1)	62.7±15.9^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	56.9±16.0	56.2±20.7^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	60.0±15.4
Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied	78(15.5)	62.1±14.3	59.4±14.1	58.8±17.5	61.2±14.1
Satisfied	374(74.4)	66.7±16.7	62.1±16.9	62.6±19.3	64.1±14.7
Thought about dropping out of graduate school
Yes	238(47.3)	60.4±15.4^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	55.2±14.9^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	56.3±18.5^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.	59.1±14.3^b b One-way ANOVA, p<0.05.
No	265(52.7)	70.3±15.8	66.5±16.0	65.9±18.8	66.9±14
Training
Nurse	150(29.8)	62.7 ±16.0^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;	59.9 ±15.8	58.3 ±19.1^a a Student's t test, p<0.05;	61.8 ±14.1
Other category	353(70.2)	66.9±16.3	61.7±16.7	62.7±19.2	63.8 ±15.0

Variables	Quality of life domains
	Physical health	Psychological	Social relationships	Environment
	β^* * β=standardized beta coefficient;	β^* * β=standardized beta coefficient;	β^* * β=standardized beta coefficient;	β^* * β=standardized beta coefficient;
Sex (female)	0,055	0,022	-0,017	-0,013
Age (years)	0,063	0,085	0,160^b b p<0.001	0,161^b b p<0.001
Children or dependents under 18 years (yes)	-	0,090^a a p<0.05;	-	-
Diagnosis of anxiety and/or depression (yes)	0,192^b b p<0.001	0,227^b b p<0.001	0,057	0,056
Difficulty in reconciling graduate studies with personal life (frequent)	0,353^b b p<0.001	0,285^b b p<0.001	0,231^b b p<0.001	0,234^b b p<0.001
Dissatisfied with the relationship with their supervisor (yes)	0,049	-	0,048	-
Thinking about dropping out of graduate school (yes)	0,160^b b p<0.001	0,213^b b p<0.001	0,164^b b p<0.001	0,172^b b p<0.001
Training (nurse)	0,035	-	0,017	-
Adjusted R2	26,8%	27,2%	18,0%	14,6%

Associação Brasileira de Enfermagem SGA Norte Quadra 603 Conj. "B" - Av. L2 Norte 70830-102 Brasília, DF, Brasil, Tel.: (55 61) 3226-0653, Fax: (55 61) 3225-4473 - Brasília - DF - Brazil
E-mail: reben@abennacional.org.br

Acompanhe os números deste periódico no seu leitor de RSS

[1] Corresponding author: Flaviane Cristina Rocha Cesar E-mail: flaviane_rocha01@hotmail.com