The adaptation of foreign students to a new country can be complicated due to different cultural values, language barriers and the way university courses are structured. The aim of the study was to analyze the lifestyle practices, satisfaction with life and the level of perceived stress of Polish and foreign students studying various medical disciplines in Poland with regard to chosen sociodemographic characteristics. The study included 231 foreign and 213 Polish students (n = 444) taking different medical disciplines at the medical university in eastern Poland. Three research tools were used: Fantastic Lifestyle Questionnaire (FLQ), Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS), Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10). Additionally, students’ sociodemographic data was collected. Two-factor analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed and correlations between variables were also examined. Our research indicated that Polish students obtained higher results in FLQ than foreign students. It also demonstrated a significantly higher level of stress among Polish students in comparison to foreign students. The self-assessment of their health condition, lifestyle, and rank associated to being healthy correlated with FLQ, SWLS and PSS-10. The present research can aid the development of support programs for foreign students so that the cultural adaptation processes would more positively influence their lifestyle and an education environment.

Health literacy (HL) is recognised as an important, modifiable factor in the self-management and health performance of elderly people. The aim of this preliminary study was to identify and analyse the level of health literacy among the elderly living in one of the eastern regions in Poland. The cross-sectional study was conducted among a convenience sample of 200 seniors aged 65+ after cognitive pre-screening with the use of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) scale. To collect data, the Polish version of the HLS-EU-Q47 was used. More than half of the elderly surveyed presented problematic levels of general HL (GEN-HL), and also problematic levels of other dimensions: health care health literacy (HC-HL), disease prevention health literacy (DP-HL), and health promotion health literacy (HP-HL). The level of seniors’ HL is dependent on the level of their education, place of living, participation in activities run by Daily Center for the Elderly, and their self-assessment of health condition (p < 0.05). These results imply the important message that there is a need to create initiatives and programs improving health literacy targeted at seniors living in rural areas, those with lower levels of education, and those with poor access to activities organised by institutions supporting seniors.

Introduction. Nursing is a profession of public trust with a fairly high position in various rankings examining the prestige of professions. Aim. Analysis of published research results on the image of nurses and nursing in Poland in the media and in the opinion of various social groups. Material and methods. A systematic review of Polish scientific literature from the years 2010-2017 was undertaken. A multi-stage search process was carried out in accordance with the adopted inclusion criteria, and then articles identified and accepted were subjected to a qualitative analysis. Results. Searching the Google Scholar database by accepted key words resulted in 10,663 records. After analyzing the titles and abstracts of these papers, 19 articles were subjected to further analysis. As a result of searching journals included in the Arianta database according to established key words, 10 articles were identified, 8 of which were qualified for further analysis. After removing duplicates, 17 articles were approved for the final analysis. Qualitative analysis of the research results published in these papers allowed to distinguish the following categories: an image of nurses and nursing in various social groups, elements of nurses’ image in the media and society, actions aiming at improving the image of nurses and nursing in Poland, changes in the image of nurses and nursing in Poland over the years and the direction of these changes. Conclusions. The issue of an image of nurses and nursing in the media and in the society has been a frequent subject of research of nurses in Poland in the recent years. These studies concern primarily opinions on the image of nurses and nursing, factors which determine the image of nurses and nursing in Poland, constitutive elements of the image, the possibility of improving the image and people/ institutions responsible for it.

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