Interest in research among female medical students at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt

Abstract

Background and aim Early research activities during medical education years are an important factor for attracting a greater number of physicians to careers in research. In the current study, the authors aimed to investigate the interest in research among medical students at the Faculty of Medicine for Girls, Al-Azhar University, Cairo, to explore the factors that contribute to emergence of interest in research and those that contribute to no interest. The authors also aimed to determine factors that prevent those who are interested in research from engaging in research activities.Participants and methods The current study is a cross-sectional one that was carried out on 420 female students who were chosen randomly from all study years. Students responded to a self-administered questionnaire.Statistical analysis Data were analyzed using statistical package for the social sciences program version 16. Testing of the hypothesis was performed at the 95% confidence level, and a P value less than 0.05 was considered significant.Results The authors found that 73.3% of the students were interested in research. A total of 62.9% of the students reported interest in research because they believed that it could be beneficial for their careers; however, the most common reasons for no interest in research was that they were more interested in clinical work (73.6%), while the most commonly cited factor for not being able to engage in research among those who were interested was lack of time (90.3%).Conclusion Despite the high interest in health research, medical students did not report any actual publication of research papers. Consequently, the authors recommend provision of a favorable research environment and assembly of a research team to support students in all steps of their research.