Background: Due to the negative effect of stress on the quality of life this research was designed to consider the effects of relaxation techniques on the stress and the quality of life of dormitory female students at Tehran university of Medical Sciences.

Materials & Methods: A field trial and before-after study was conducted on a random sample of 200 female dormitory students of Tehran Medical Sciences University. The students of two dorms were considered as the experimental group and the students of two other dorms were chosen as control group. A pretest was administered on both groups using the spielberger anxiety inventory and WHO quality of life questionnaire. Then the experimental group was instructed to do the relaxation techniques for two months. A posttest was administered on both groups after two months. The data were analyzed statistically using t test, paired t test and c 2.

Results: The mean age of samples was 22.97±2.47. Half of the control and 62% of the experimental group were between the 2-4 years of their studying. The majority of both groups were in dorms for 27.77±19.07 months. The mean score of stress for control and experimental group were 1.51 and 1.29 their mean scores of total QOL were 3.15 and 3.16 respectively. So no significant difference was detected between the quality of life scores of both groups before the intervention (p=0.87). However, significant differences were noticed between the two groups after the intervention (p<0.05). The quality of life did not significantly change in control group except for the physical health domain (p=0.02). However the scores of most of domains increased in experimental group (p<0.001). The overall quality of life score was higher in experimental group after the two months of relaxation exercises (p<0.05).

Conclusions: The relaxation techniques can relieve the stress and improve some aspects of the quality of life. A more comprehensive study with matched random allocated groups is recommended.