Physical Activity and Health-Related Quality of Life in Pregnant Women

Background: physical activity (pa) and health-related quality of life (hrqol) are significantly affected in pregnancy. objectives: theaimof this studywasto assess these constructsamongnigerian pregnantwomenandalso examine the relationship between them. methods: a total of 140 pregnant women were recruited from four selected antenatal clinics in ile-ife, osun state, nigeria, who participated in this cross-sectional study. the pregnancy physical activity questionnaire (ppaq); consisting of 33 questions aimed at evaluating different day to day activities and sf-12 health survey; an eight scale grouped questionnaire were used to assess pa and hrqol, respectively. descriptive statistics (mean, standard deviation, frequency, and percentage) and inferential statistics (pearson product moment correlation and one-way anova) were used for data analysis. alpha level was set at p < 0.05. results: the mean age of the participants was 30.44.33 years. household (347.0452.1) and vigorous intensity (14.330.8) pa constituted the highest and least forms of pa. on the other hand, role limitation-physical (82.018.3) and health perception (82.0 18.0), and role limitation-mental (54.250), respectively were the highest and least rated scales on sf-12. the hrqol scores were not significantly different (p > 0.05) across the three trimesters of pregnancy except for physical functioning (p = 0.023). however, there were significant differences in pa across the three trimester of pregnancy (p < 0.05), except for vigorous intensity (p = 0.072), sport (p = 0.057), and occupational activity (p = 0.057). there were significant correlations among hrqol sub-scales and each of household, occupational, and moderate intensity pa only (p < 0.05). conclusions: light to moderate intensity and household pa are predominant among nigerian pregnant women than vigorous intensity, occupational, and sports-related pa. higher health perception and physical role limitation in hrqol were mostly demonstrated by the pregnant women. there was a significant inverse relationship between hrqol and each of moderate intensity, occupational, and household pa.