International Journal of Caring Sciences January-April 2018 Volume 11 | Issue 1| Page 100 www.internationaljournalofcaringsciences.org Original Article Assessing the Health-Related Quality of Life of Nurses in the Public Sector of Cyprus Mikaella Symeou Konstantinou, R.N, MSc, PhD Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus, General Hospital of Nicosia, Cyprus Andri Efstathiou, RN, MSc, PhD Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus, Emergency Room, Limassol General Hospital, Cyprus Georgios Charalambous, MD, MSc, PhD General Hospital of Athens “Hippocratio”, Athens, Greece Daphne Kaitelidou, PhD National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece Eleni Jelastopulu, PhD Department of Public Health, Medical School, University of Patras, Greece Correspondence: Mikaella Symeou, Frederick University, Nicosia, Cyprus, Aisxylou 15 Panw Deutera, 2460, Nicosia, Cyprus E-mail: symeoumikaella@gmail.com Abstract Background: The health-related quality of life (HRQoL) encompasses the general health, functional ability, physical symptoms and emotional, cognitive, social and sexual functions of an individual. Although the HRQoL has been extensively studied in both patients and the general population, there is a limited number of studies of the HRQoL in the nursing profession. Aims: This paper aimed to investigate the HRQoL of nurses working in the public hospitals of Cyprus and the factors affecting it. Methodology: This was a cross-sectional study conducted from April 2016 through May 2016. To fulfil the needs of this study, a representative sample of nurses from seven public hospitals in Cyprus was used. The nurses were asked to respond to the Medical Outcomes Study Short Form-12 (SF-12), and their demographic and work characteristics were collected. The statistical processing was done with IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 20.0. Results: The nurses scored averages of 49.96 on the Physical Health Composite Scale (PCS) and 50.00 on the Mental Health Composite Scale (MCS). The lowest score was seen in the dimension of vitality, with an average of 57.22, and the highest score was in the body function dimension, with an average of 80.81. The scoring for the above scales ranged from 0–100. Overall, the males showed better physical health (p=0.035) and mental health (p=0.023) than the females. Moreover, a positive relationship was found between the physical and mental health (p=0.000). Conclusions: The PCS and MCS scores of the nurses fell in the middle of the scale, which is expected to happen in the general population. Studying the HRQoL in nurses is particularly important, since it can lead to the development of a policy for improving the working conditions in nursing homes. Keywords: nurses, health-related quality of life, SF-12 Background The quality of life is defined by the World Health Organization (WHO) as the “individual perceptions of people about their place in life in the light of the cultural context in which they live, and in relation to goals, expectations, models and their interests”. The quality of life combines the physical health, psychological status, level of independence, social relationships and personal beliefs, as well as the relationships of individuals with basic environmental characteristics that depend mainly on their cultural, social and natural environment [WHO Quality of Life (WHOQOL) Group, 1998]. The health-related quality of life (HRQoL) was created in the medical sciences, focusing mainly