Background: The high incidence of and death by breast cancer show that breast cancer requires serious treatment. Studies revealed that the physical activity of survivors of breast cancer significantly reduced after a diagnosis of breast cancer.
Objective: This study aimed to examine the effect of supportive-educative nursing intervention (SENI) on the knowledge, attitudes and behaviour of survivors of breast cancer towards the intensity of physical activity.
Methods: The study population included patients with breast cancer living in a palliative shelter of a referral hospital. Data were obtained from 61 respondents (intervention group, n = 30; control group, n = 31). The study used a pre-test and post-test design with a control group (quasi-experiment with control).
Results: SENI showed a significant effect on the knowledge (p = 0.000) and attitude (p = 0.000) of the participants towards physical activity. SENI did not demonstrate a significant effect on increasing the intensity of physical activity (p = 0.413).
Conclusions: Descriptively, the intensity of physical activity showed a tendency to increase in the intervention group, but no significant effect was noted. Palliative shelters in community can hold programmes that may increase the physical activity of survivors.
Keywords: Educative nursing intervention; physical activity.