[Correlation between type of personality and academic achievement of nursing students in university of medical sciences Qazvin]

Introduction: Academic achievement will be self-actualization and promote confident of students; intelligence, memory and type of personality are the psychological factors that affect learning. This study was performed to determine the relationship between type of personality and academic achievement of nursing students

Methods: This is an analytic study; subjects consisted of 161 undergraduate Nursing students [The third term and higher] at Qazvin Nursing college in 2009. The subjects were assessed by demographic questionnaire, Eysenck's personality inventory and total average of semesters as academic achievement. Data were analyzed by chi-squire, analysis of Variance and parson correlation with significant level of 0.05 and using SPPS v.15

Results: The results from 161 subjects showed 83.9% females and 16.1% male. And most samples [44.1%] were extroversion with instability personality. Statistical tests showed significant relationship between type of personality and total average [P=0.023, F=3.25]. There was significant negative correlation between academic achievement with introversion [r=-0.167, P=0.038]

Conclusion: So it seems academic achievement is also affected by characteristic of personality and psychological status; therefore further study of student's personality in several fields and creating more consultation centers in universities are necessary

[Mental health of Qazvin, Zanjan and Arak students who are the sons and daughters of victims of war [2007]]

In this study, the degree of mental health among students whoes parents have been the war sacrifices and martyrs in Qazvin, Zanjan and Arak Universities of Medical Sciences was evaluated. The present work was a cross-sectional study performed on all registered students of war sacrifices and martyrs. The GHQ-28 questionnaire was used and a score of 23 considered as cut off point for general scale. The data showed that 28.6% of students under the study were suspected of having mental disorder. When the data were calculated for individual universities, the rates obtained for Zanjan, Arak and Qazvin universities were 40.7%, 26.8% and 25.6% respectively. The undergraduate students need more attention than the others do. Additionally, a combination of questionnaire methods and clinical protocols are also suggested

Acupoint massage in improving sleep quality of older adults

Elderly people often suffer from disturbed sleep and Traditional Chinese acupressure is a noninvasive technique that employs pressure and massage to acupoints in order to stimulate the balance of life energy that promotes health and comfort. The purpose of present study was to determine the effectiveness of acupoints massage in elders experiencing sleep disturbances. In this quasi experimental study which was applied as single blind clinical trial, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality index [PSQI] questionnaire was used as a screening tool to select individuals with sleep disturbance by purpo'seful sampling. Then the individuals were assigned to three groups by balanced a randomized method [an acupressure group, a sham acupressure group and control group]. Each group had 30 subjects and gender ratio was equal in three groups. The same massage was used in the acupressure group and the sham acupressure group, whereas only conversation was employed in the control group. Time of interventions was limited to 15 min. One course of intervention lasted for 3 days per week. These interventions were carried out for 4 consecutive weeks. After intervention 77 persons completed the questionnaire. Repeated measure ANOVA, ANCOVA and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used for data analysis. The analysis of data post intervention showed significant differences in PSQI subscale scores of the subjective sleep quality [P=0.025], sleep duration [P=0.012], sleep efficiency [P=0.022], sleep disturbance [P=0.025], daily performance [P=0.033], sleep latency [P<0.001] and global PSQI scores [P<0.001] among three groups. POST HOC comparison showed significant differences in PSQI subscales scores and global PSQI scores in the acupressure group compared to control group [P<0.05]. Whereas, there was significant difference only in PSQI subscales scores of the sleep latency [P=0.006] and global PSQI scores [P=0.021] in the acupressure group compared to the sham acupressure group. Sleep log data showed significant decrease of awake time and improving the quality of sleep in acupressure group [P<0.001]. This study confirmed the effectiveness of acupressure in improving the quality of sleep of elderly people and offered a nonpharmacological therapy method for sleep-disturbed elderly people