Health-related life quality levels of children with chronic diseases attending hospital schools and teachers' and children's views about these school

The present study investigated the life quality levels of students, who have inpatient treatment at hospitals due to a chronic disease and continue their schooling at the hospital school/class, comparatively according to several variables. Also, the opinions of students and their teachers on those schools/classes were collected and analyzed with qualitative methodology. The research was conducted at three hospital schools/classes located in Izmir; the sample comprises of 7 teachers and 100 students (female=56, male=44), ages of whom ranged from 7-16 and classes of whom were from 1 to 11. KINDL, health related life quality scale for kids, was used to collect the quantitative data and qualitative data were collected via interview questions prepared by the researcher herself for the students and the teachers. t statistics, variance analysis, Kruskal-Wallis, Mann-Whitney U test and Pearson Product Moment Correlation technique were used in the analysis of quantitative data, whereas in the analysis of qualitative data, for the answers given to written questions, common themes were identified, frequency and percentages were calculated. While the research findings showed to no significant difference in students' life quality levels according to gender; age, class level, duration of treatment and hospitalization were found to exhibit significant difference on life quality levels. Negative significant relationships were found between age, class level and self-esteem and school related life quality level, and also duration of treatment and life quality level on friendship; on the other hand, positive significant relationships were observed between duration of treatment and family related life quality levels. Considering their answers to written questions, students predominantly stated that they studied, did their homework and worked on tests at hospital schools/classes, that they liked playing computer and intelligence games and they were not bored and that they believed in the assistance those schools provided; teachers expressed that they were morally delighted to help the kids and their families, however they surfaced some unfavorable issues like kids' reluctance towards schooling, having student variation at schools/classes and kids having adaptation problems.