The Effect of Patient Education and Nurse- led Telephone Follow-up (Tele nursing) on Quality of Life in Patients with Epilepsy

Epilepsy is the second most common neurological disease in the world. The widespread physical, psychological, and social consequences of epilepsy have led to a lower quality of life than other patients with other chronic diseases. This study aimed to determine The Effect of Patient Education and Nurse- led Telephone Follow-up (Tele nursing) on Quality of Life in Patients with Epilepsy

 In this quasi-experimental study, 60 patients referred to the neurology clinic of Valiasr Hospital in Zanjan were selected by convenience sampling method and were randomly divided into control and experimental groups. Epilepsy Quality of Life Questionnaire) QOLIE-31-P) was used for data collection. Questionnaires were completed by the participants before the intervention. Then, telephone education was performed for the experimental group for two months and no intervention for the control group. Two months after the intervention, all patients completed the questionnaire again. Finally, the collected data were analyzed using SPSS software version 25 using descriptive (mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (Chi-square, Independent t-test, and Paired t-test).

 Before the intervention, there was no statistically significant difference between the two groups in terms of demographic characteristics and scores of different areas of quality of life (P >0.05); However, after the intervention, the results of the T-pair test showed a statistically significant difference between the overall score of quality of life and its dimensions in the control and test group, so that the test group had a higher ratio of quality of life (P <0.05).

According to the results of the present study, the use of telephone education methods can help improve the quality of life of patients with epilepsy. Therefore, its use is recommended in the training program for patients with epilepsy.