A Correlational Study to Assess the Degree of Lifestyle Modifications and its Relationship with Quality of Life among patients undergoing Hemodialysis in a Tertiary Care Hospital in Central Kerala

A correlational study was done to assess the degree of lifestyle modifications and its relationship with quality of life among patients undergoing hemodialysis in a tertiary care hospital in Central Kerala. The objectives of the study were to assess the relationship between lifestyle modifications and quality of life among patients undergoing hemodialysis, to assess the association of lifestyle modifications with the selected socio-demographic variables and to assess the association of quality of life with the selected socio-demographic variables. The study design used is correlational study design. The study was conducted in M.O.S. CMedical Mission Hospital, Kolenchery, using convenient sampling, 90 hemodialysis patients were enrolled in the study. Socio-demographic performa, a self-structured questionnaire on lifestyle modifications and a standardized questionnaire of KDQOL-36 Quality of Life Assessment were used to collect the data. The data analysis was done using descriptive and inferential statistics like percentage, frequency, mean and standard deviation. The study results showed that, there is a statistically significant weak negative correlation between lifestyle modifications and the domain of symptom or problem affecting the quality-of-life ina hemodialysis patient (p=0.043). There is a significant association between lifestyle modifications and selected socio-demographic variables such as age, marital status, occupation and income (p=0.005, p=0.010, p=0.023, p=0.028 respectively). Also, there is a significant association between the quality of life and the socio-demographic variable of burden of medical expenses (p=0.034).