the relationship between sleep quality with fatigue severity and academic performance of nursing students

background & aim : increasing students’ academic stress especially during taking final exams may result in sleep  disorders, fatigue, poor academic performance and low functional efficiency. the aim of this study was to determine the relationship between sleep quality with fatigue severity and academic performance of nursing students. methods & materials : in a cross-sectional study, the sleep quality and fatigue of nursing students (n=138) of aja university of medical sciences in tehran, iran were assessed using pittsburgh sleep quality index and fatigue severity scale within last week of exams of second semester in 2013. subjects filled demographic questionnaires and the response rate was 86.8%. the data were analyzed using spss software with descriptive and analytic statistics including chi square, pearson and spearman’s rho correlation coefficients. results : sleep quality in 64.4% of students was poor. about 77% of students suffered from fatigue in moderate to severe levels. the mean of total scores of lessens was 16.16. chi-square test and pearson correlation coefficient did not indicate significant relationship between sleep quality and age, gender, education semester and educational level, material status, habitancy location, caffeine consuming, smoking, experience of suffering from chronic and psychological diseases, working and also experience of major stress (p>0.05).spearman’s rho correlation coefficient indicated significant relationship between sleep quality and fatigue severity (p≤0.0000), whereas pearson correlation coefficient did not show significant relationship between sleep quality and academic performance and also between fatigue severity and academic performance (p>0.05). conclusion : prevalence of poor sleep quality and fatigue during final exams in nursing students is high. considering importance of sleep quality and quantity and its effect on academic performances, creating suitable conditions for improving sleep quality is suggested.