Thermalism as A Determinant of Quality of Life and Sleep: A Novel Approach to The Sector Using SF-36v2 and Pittsburgh Index

• Autor(a) principal: Pereira, Sandra
• Data de Publicação: 2021
• Outros Autores: Silva, Jani, Marques, Catarina, Galvão, Ana Maria, Alves, Maria José
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10198/23917
• topic: Spa Therapy,; Thermalism; Quality of Life,; Quality of Sleep; Pittsburgh Index

Thermalism has been used to improve health status, with emphasis on well-being, including relaxation, stress relief, depression, and even recovery and energy reserve. This study aimed to evaluate the perception of quality of life (QOL) by SF 36v2, and the quality of sleep, using the Pittsburgh Index, in individuals who attended the therapeutic thermalism at Chaves thermal Spa, in different treatment time points, pre-and post-treatment for 14 days. Methodology: Thermal Spa patients attending therapeutic thermalism at Chaves thermal Spa (N=90) completed a questionnaire with information on sociodemographic data, on health-related quality of life (SF-36v2), and on quality of sleep (Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI)). Results: In the thermal pre-treatment evaluation, participants revealed a good quality of life in the physical and social functioning, vitality, emotional role functioning, and mental health domains. In the post-treatment assessment, there all QOL indexes were improved, physical functioning, physical role functioning, bodily pain, and emotional role functioning. The participants revealed a good sleep quality in the following dimensions: sleep duration and efficiency, use of sleeping medications, and daytime dysfunction. In the second evaluation time-point, there was an improvement of all sleep quality indices, except for the sleep duration component. Regarding the quality of life and sleep by sociodemographic variables, data revealed that men had a better quality of life and sleep than women. Conclusion: Thermal treatments provided significant benefits for the quality of life and sleep. These results may contribute to improve the knowledge on the potentialities of thermal treatments and, ultimately to attract tourists seeking the benefits of thermal waters on its holistic vision.