Abstract:
Limited knowledge and negative attitudes about menopause among postmenopausal women (PMW) create a multitude of health-related issues leading to impaired quality of life (QOL) among them. This study evaluated the impact of a health-promoting lifestyle education intervention (HPLEI) on knowledge, attitude, and QOL in a group of PMW in Sri Lanka. A quasi-experimental study was conducted with 72 PMW, matched for sociodemographic status of the community from two geographically separated areas in Galle, and they were allocated to intervention () and control () groups. HPLEI is comprised of health education sessions focused on postmenopausal health management with lifestyle modifications provided only for the intervention group for 8 weeks and follow-up for 6 months. The control group was not given any planned education programme and was allowed to proceed with the usual lifestyle during this period. Knowledge, attitude, menopause-specific QOL (MENQOL), and overall QOL were evaluated in both groups with self-administered questionnaires at the baseline, after 8 weeks of education sessions and at the end of 6 months of follow-up. The mean (SD) ages of the intervention and control groups were 54.6 (4.5) and 56.5 (3.4) () years, respectively. All evaluated variable scores were not different between the intervention and control groups () at the baseline. In the intervention group, knowledge (; ) and attitude (; ) scores increased at the end (). In the control group, a marginal increase in all dimensions of knowledge scores (; ) and unchanged attitude scores (; ) were seen. All MENQOL scores decreased during the follow-up in the intervention group (; ) () except the sexual domain (). MENQOL scores were increased in the control group (; ) () with time. Overall QOL scores increased (; ) () in the intervention group during the study period and in the control group overall QOL (; ) showed a reduction () at the end. Health education focused on health-promoting lifestyle modifications was effective in improving knowledge, attitude, MENQOL, and overall QOL of PMW.
