Facing psychological effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. A view from the perception of medical students from 1st to 6th year of the Faculty of Medical Sciences of the National University of Asunción.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic presented itself with characteristics of a critical global incident that impacted the mental health of members of the educational community. In March 2020, the Faculty of Medical Sciences, FCM, was the first academic unit of the National University of Asunción, UNA, to revert to an emergency digital format, with total suspension of face-to-face classes. This paper explores how the pandemic impacted students´ lives at FCM-UNA, from their perception, to understand and identify possible emerging mental health problems and accompany the process of adaptation to the new normal in the post-pandemic. The work is descriptive, and qualitative, with an interpretative approach. The target population was students from 1st to 6th year of medical school who voluntarily agreed to participate in the research. The information collection technique was the focus group, applied in two phases, phase 1 - exploratory and phase 2 - deepening. The unit of analysis was the speeches of the participants. The results obtained reveal that the first phase of the pandemic took place in a virtual context of pain, fear, and helplessness in tension with the subsequent resilient struggle to transform this adversity, manifested by the students. The psycho-social dimension of the construction of professional identity was perhaps the most affected. The observations made have served as a basis for the planning and implementation of guidelines for the detection of risk cases, accompaniment, and guidance, providing adequate teaching support in the post-pandemic period.