Stress in first year medical students.

Abstract

3. Results Out of 300 students invited to participate in the study, 278 (92.8%) completed and submitted the questionnaire. The age of the students was in range of 17-21 years. Out of 278 participants, 165 (59.3%) were males and 113 (40.7%) were females. All the students were Indians. Among these participants 204 (73.3%) had attended English medium school whereas only 74 (26.7%) had gone to Malayalam (local language of Kerala) medium schools. A total of 14 (5.1%) had educational gap; the most common reason was preparation of pre-medical entrance test. Out of 278 students 199 (71.5%) were residing in the hostels of the institute, whereas 79 (28.5%) were day scholars. None of the participants were married. Out of 165 male students, 42 (25.4%) reported high level of stress whereas in 34 (30.1%) of 113 female students the stress was reported to be high. In this study the female students reported high levels of stress as compared to their male counterparts. Abstract Stress in medical students is not uncommon and is process orientated. Although minimal amount of stress is desirable and is necessary to spark in a healthy competitive spirit, the undue stress has undesirable impact on students. Objective: The present study was designed with an aim to evaluate different stress factors among the first MBBS students. Method: The participants were asked to complete a pre-tested and pre-designed questionnaire that included a list of sources of stress. Results: The most common stress factor reported by participants were high parental expectations (80.9%), vast syllabus (73%), worry about future (71.3%), long duration of course (67.3%), frequency of examinations (66.7%), performance in formative and summative examination (66%), low self esteem (62.3%), lack of sleep (54%) and lack of emotional and social support (38%).