Abstract
Medicine and healthcare professions are prestigious and valued careers and, at the same time, demanding, challenging, and arduous jobs. Medical and allied health professions students, experiencing a stressful academic and clinical workload, may suffer from sleep disturbances. In Iran, several studies have been conducted to explore the prevalence rate among medical and healthcare professions students. The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to quantitatively and rigorously summarize the existing scholarly literature, providing the decision- and policy-makers and educators with an updated, evidence-based synthesis. Only studies utilizing a reliable psychometric instrument, such as the Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI), were included, in order to have comparable measurements and estimates. Seventeen investigations were retained in the present systematic review and meta-analysis, totaling a sample of 3586 students. Studies were conducted between 2008 and 2018 and reported an overall rate of sleep disturbances of 58% (95% confidence interval or CI 45–70). No evidence of publication bias could be found, but formal analyses on determinants of sleep disturbances could not be run due to the dearth of information that could be extracted from studies. Poor sleep is highly prevalent among Iranian medical and healthcare professions students. Based on the limitations of the present study, high-quality investigations are urgently needed to better capture the determinants of poor sleep quality among medical and healthcare professions students, given the importance and the implications of such a topic.
Highlights
Medicine and allied health professions represent prestigious and esteemed careers, but they are at the same time challenging, arduous, and demanding jobs, which require serious commitment, strenuous study, and high levels of motivation and dedication [1]
Duplicate studies were deleted after entering the list of retrieved items in the commercial EndNote Version 7.0 software (Thomson Reuters, Toronto, ON, Canada)
Two studies reported the mean scores of the PSQI indicating poor sleep quality but not enough quantitative details enabling computation of the prevalence rate of sleep disturbances, and were excluded with reason from the quantitative synthesis
Summary
Medicine and allied health professions represent prestigious and esteemed careers, but they are at the same time challenging, arduous, and demanding jobs, which require serious commitment, strenuous study, and high levels of motivation and dedication [1]. The environment is competitive and aggressive ambition has become a highly pervasive phenomenon Taken together, these factors contribute, at least partially, to explain the poor sleep quality experienced by the majority of medical and healthcare professions students, who tend to reduce the amount of hours they sleep in an attempt to adjust and cope with their workload, stringent deadlines, and the harsh environment in which they live. These factors contribute, at least partially, to explain the poor sleep quality experienced by the majority of medical and healthcare professions students, who tend to reduce the amount of hours they sleep in an attempt to adjust and cope with their workload, stringent deadlines, and the harsh environment in which they live This may have a dramatic impact on the current academic and clinical performance, on the learning process, and potentially on future medical activities [2], as well as on health outcomes in general. Impairs memory and alertness, and results, if chronic, in relevant psychological distress and diseases (including anxiety disorder and depression) and in a severe burden of cardiovascular co-morbidity [3,4,5,6,7]
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
