Self-Care Education Based on Learning Style and its Impact on Lifestyle of Patients with Hypertension

Hypertension is one of the leading causes of death in the world. Some more effective management of this disease can be achieved by making changes in the lifestyles of patients by self-care education. It is important to use new educational methods to better influence education on people's learning. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of using educational tools appropriate to learning style during self-care training on the lifestyle of hypertensive patients.

This quasi-experimental study was performed on 44 patients with hypertension who were divided into four groups of visual, auditory, reading/writing and kinesthetic based on their answers to the VARK learning style questionnaire. Patients' self-care training was conducted in the form of four 60-minute sessions based on the learning style of each group. Before and two months after the intervention, the LSQ lifestyle questionnaire was completed by all patients, and finally, data were analyzed using SPSS ver.21.

According to the results of the present study, the mean score of lifestyle dimensions of all research units at all stages of lifestyle increased significantly after the educational intervention compared to before the intervention, (p< 0.001). Also, the increase in the mean of the total lifestyle score after the intervention compared to the time before it was statistically significant (p<0.001).

Considering the favorable effect of self-care education based on learning style in promoting patients' lifestyle, this educational method can be used as a cheap and practical method in changing the behavior of hypertensive patients.