Sleep quality in medical students and its different effects

Abstract

Background. Sleep disorders is a distressing and disabling condition that affects many people, and can effect the quality of work and education of medical students. Sleep problems, which are accompanied by disruption of the circadian cycle in students, are partly solved by sports and psychological influences (sleep hygiene). Purpose of the study was to assess the sleep quality during different years of study of medical university students. Materials & Methods. First to final year students (114 male and 80 female) filled out questionnaires. Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) questions were used in the form. Qualitative variables were represented as frequencies and percentages. Chi-square and was applied for statistical significance, and p-value <0.05 was considered. The students were divided according to their years of study into 3 groups. Group A for 1st- and 2nd-years, group B – for 3rd- and 4th-years, group C – for 5th- and 6th-years medical students. Results. About half (47.42%) of the students rated their sleep as very bad, which, however, is less than in the literature (more than 60%). 57% of respondents had daytime dysfunction due to sleep disturbance. 60.31% of survey participants reported that they slept 5–7 hours every night. 20.1% regularly used sleeping pills at least once during the last month. Subjective sleep quality and sleep latency were directly related to the years of study, with p values 0.006 and 0.004. Conclusion. Our findings show that sleep disruptions among medical students is significant. By calculating the mean score of PSQI we found that the score values increase respectively with the years of studies in the medical faculty explaining more sleep disturbances. Keywords: sleep disorders, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, sleep hygiene.