General health, anxiety, and depression: relationship with perceived self-efficacy and positive mental health in nursing students.

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the general health, anxiety, and depression of nursing students and analyze their relationship with the perception of general self-efficacy and positive mental health while coping with COVID-19. METHOD: A cross-sectional, descriptive, and correlational study with 138 nursing students from a public institution. Instruments were applied for sociodemographic variables, the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, the General Self-Efficacy Scale, the General Health Questionnaire, and the Positive Mental Health Questionnaire. The analyses included descriptive statistics, correlations, and univariate and multivariate logistic regression. RESULTS: A 5% increase in the Positive Mental Health score was associated with a 20.4% reduction in the probability of anxiety (OR = 0.83; 95% CI: 0.73-0.93) and a 26.6% reduction in the probability of depression (OR = 0.79; 95% CI: 0.70-0.89). Similar increases in the General Health Questionnaire were associated with higher probabilities of anxiety (29%) and depression (18%). A 5% increase in the perception of general self-efficacy reduced the probability of both outcomes (anxiety and depression) by 12.4%. CONCLUSION: Positive mental health and self-efficacy were protective factors, reinforcing the importance of institutional actions to promote academic well-being.