The effect of progressive relaxation exercise on psychological symptoms and mental well-being in patients with schizophrenia

The study was carried out to determine the effect of progressive relaxation exercise applied to patients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia on psychiatric evaluation and mental well-being. The research was conducted as a quasi-experimental model with pretest-posttest control group in three community mental health centers (TRSM) located in Mardin and Elazığ city center. The patients diagnosed with schizophrenia who attended the TRSM regularly constituted the population of the study, and a total of 90 patients, 45 of whom were in the intervention group and 45 in the control group, formed the sample of the study. Data were collected with the Personal Information Form, the Brief psychiatric assessment scale (BPRS) and the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-Being Scale (WEMIOS). Progressive relaxation exercise was applied to the patients in the experimental group. No intervention was performed on the patients in the control group. In the evaluation of the data; percentage distribution, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, chi-square, independent groups t test, paired t test were used. As a result of the analyzes made; In the pre-test, there was no significant difference between the patients in the intervention group and the control group in terms of the mean WEMIOS and BPRS scores (p>0.05). In the post-test, it was determined that the mean WEMIOS score of the patients in the intervention group increased significantly and the mean score of BPRS significantly decreased compared to the patients in the control group (p<0.05). As a result of this study, it was determined that PGE applications in individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia were effective in reducing psychiatric symptoms and increasing the level of mental well-being. For this reason, PGE is recommended to be applied as a complementary treatment by psychiatric nurses and other mental health professionals during the treatment process of schizophrenia patients.