Cyberchondria in First Year Medical Students of Yogyakarta

Abstract

Cyberchondria is a relatively new term addressing health anxiety associated with online information. Research data is scarce, as most instruments measuring anxiety do not consider online behavior an important factor. Medical students are arguably assumed to have frequent health anxieties, i.e. “medical student syndrome.” Moreover, they are exposed to large amounts of information. We aimed to measure the level of cyberchondria severity of first-year medical students. First-year medical students of the regular program at Universitas Gadjah Mada completed self-reported instruments (the Cyberchondria Severity Scale (CSS) and the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI)). Cut off was determined using ROC analysis to find the best score that corresponded to BAI cut off of 16. Data were analyzed using chi square and t-tests to analyze any differences between gender. Respondents were 162 students, 54 males and 108 females, with mean age 18.18-year-old ± 0.696. Based on ROC analysis, cut off of 75.5 corresponded with BAI score of 16. Mean CSS score was 70.73 ± 16.292. There was no significant difference of CSS scores between genders. Based on the analysis of individual items, compared to male students, female students more frequently searched for physical symptoms on the Internet, and afterwards, consulted the results with a General Practitioner (GP), discussed with a GP, or went to other specialists; and thus, more frequently required reassurance after online search. In contrast, male students more frequently had difficulty relaxing after searching online for physical symptoms. We concluded that there was no difference of overall cyberchondria severity score, but there were slight but significant differences of online behavior between genders.