Efficacy of Stress Management Program on the level of perceived stress and Coping Strategies among Baccalaureate Nursing Students

Background: Undergraduate nursing students experience significant stress and anxiety, stress has been known as a barrier to concentration, problem solving, decision making, and other important abilities for students’ learning. The Ways of coping with such stress would be more important than the nature of stress itself. Aim: the aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of stress management program on the level of perceived stress and coping strategies among Baccalaureate Nursing Students. Subject and method: A quasi-experimental with one group pre-test post-test design was selected for the study. A convenience sampling of 100 nursing students at academic year (2017-2018). The study was conducted at faculty of nursing, Tanta University affiliated to the Ministry of Higher Education. Tools of data collection ; three tools were used to collect the data for the study ;University student's perceived stressors questionnaire, Coping inventory of stressful situations and Perceived stress scale Method: The nursing students were divided into subgroups; each subgroup encompassed 15 students (8 students for each researcher). Each subgroup was attending a total of 6 sessions. These sessions were scheduled as 3 sessions per week for duration of 2 weeks. Each session was lasted for about two hours. Results: More than half of the study participants were classified as having a high level of stress and the most used coping strategies were emotion focused and avoidance focused strategy before implementing the program. There was a statistical significant difference in the level of stress and coping strategies used by nursing students among the two phases of the program. Conclusion: The program was effective in reducing stress level and improves coping strategies.