Abstract
BackgroundIt has been previously shown that a high percentage of medical students have sleep problems that interfere with academic performance and mental health.MethodsTo study the impact of sleep quality, daytime somnolence, and sleep deprivation on medical students, we analyzed data from a multicenter study with medical students in Brazil (22 medical schools, 1350 randomized medical students). We applied questionnaires of daytime sleepiness, quality of sleep, quality of life, anxiety and depression symptoms and perception of educational environment.Results37.8% of medical students presented mild values of daytime sleepiness (Epworth Sleepiness Scale - ESS) and 8.7% presented moderate/severe values. The percentage of female medical students that presented ESS values high or very high was significantly greater than male medical students (p < 0.05). Students with lower ESS scores presented significantly greater scores of quality of life and perception of educational environment and lower scores of depression and anxiety symptoms, and these relationships showed a dose-effect pattern. Medical students reporting more sleep deprivation showed significantly greater odds ratios of presenting anxiety and depression symptoms and lower odds of good quality of life or perception of educational environment.ConclusionsThere is a significant association between sleep deprivation and daytime sleepiness with the perception of quality of life and educational environment in medical students.
Highlights
It has been previously shown that a high percentage of medical students have sleep problems that interfere with academic performance and mental health
Sleep problems are very frequent in the general population and medical students are one group that is vulnerable to poor sleep [1, 2]
The percentages of female medical students that presented Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) values high or very high were significantly greater than male medical students
Summary
It has been previously shown that a high percentage of medical students have sleep problems that interfere with academic performance and mental health. There are many reasons to the high prevalence of sleep problems in medical students, including many hours of classes and study, clinical clerkships that include overnight work, emotional stress, choices concerning lifestyle and many hours using virtual social media [4, 5]. There is evidence that enough good quality sleep is important for long term learning, for neurocognitive and psychomotor performance and for physical and mental health [6]. There are concerns related to patient safety when health professionals are sleep deprived. A review by Curcio et al suggested that student learning and academic performance are closely related to sleep quantity and quality [7]
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