Studies have indicated that lack of regular
physical exercise and not adhering to a health-promot- ing lifestyle among
student nurses are barriers to their encouraging patients to exercise. On the
other hand, nurses who personally embrace physical activity are more likely to
encourage their patients to improve their health through physical activity or
diet. As a result, promoting an active and healthy lifestyle among student
nurses is important because this has a crucial role in their subsequently
encouraging healthy lifestyles among their patients. The aims of this study
were to determine the physical activity levels and health-promoting lifestyles
among student nurses in Malaysia, and to investigate whether there was a
correlation between the physical activity levels of student nurses and their
lifestyle habits. Further investigation was also carried out to correlate
lifestyle habits with physical activity during weekdays and at the weekends.
This study involved 189 student nurses who were pursuing Diplomas and Bachelor
Degrees in local government universities. The Yamax Digi-Walker pedometer was
used to measure physical activity, while the Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile
(HPLP) II questionnaire was used to assess the health-pro- moting lifestyles of
the participants. The HPLP II consisted of six sub-scales which included health
responsibility, physical activity, nutrition, spiritual growth, interpersonal
relations, and stress management. According to the results on physical
activity, the student nurses had a mean of 8275.97 ± 2210.174 steps per day and
were thus categorised as somewhat active. Additionally, the student nurses were
found to be more active during weekends (M = 8389.75, SD = 2689.12) as compared
to weekdays (M = 8230.46, SD = 2353.97). According to previous studies, both
step counts are classified in the “somewhat active” category. Overall, the
results for HPLP II showed that student nurses students in Malaysia had a
positive health-promoting lifestyle with a score of 2.58 ± 0.34 on a 4-point
Likert scale. The highest score was reported in spiritual growth, with a score
of 2.92 ± 0.43. Meanwhile, physical activity was observed to be the lowest,
with a score of 1.74 ± 0.39. The results found no correlation between physical
activity and overall health-promoting lifestyle among student nurses in Malaysia
(r = 0.06, n = 189, p < 0.37). However, there was a significant relationship
between physical activity (measured by the pedometer) and physical activity
habit (measured through the questionnaire) among the student nurses (r = 0.24,
n = 189, p < 0.01). According to the findings, when the participants
indicated in the questionnaire that they were active physically, the pedometer
readings also showed a corresponding similarity in terms of their daily
physical activities.