"The psychological impact of COVID-19 on medical education of final year students in Pakistan: A cross-sectional study" (original) (raw)

COVID-19 Pandemic Affects the Medical Students’ Learning Process and Assaults Their Psychological Wellbeing

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health

Background: With the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, people are living within a milieu of stress, anxiety, and fear. Medical students are susceptible to these emotional injuries, but their psychological wellbeing and learning may further be assaulted by future uncertainties and altered teaching and training programs. Our objective was to find the extent of the psychological impact of the pandemic and the learning difficulties they are experiencing; Methodology: This cross-sectional study included 418 undergraduate and postgraduate medical students from all over the world. A questionnaire was uploaded in Google survey form. It included background characteristics, questions for psychiatric impact like PHQ-9, GAD-7, ZF-OCS, and questions for learning difficulties perceived in comparison to the pre-pandemic time. Results: Among participants, 34.9% of students were male and 65.1% female. Around 46.4% belonged to the WHO, Eastern Mediterranean region, 26.8% from South East Asia region...

Psychological Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Medical Students

2021

Objective: To ascertain the prevalence of stress and anxiety disorder affecting the learning behaviors on Medical students during pandemic of COVID-19, so that strategies to cope would be streamlined. Methods: This Cross-sectional study was carried out at AL-Aleem Medical College, Lahore attached with Gulab Devi Educational Complex, over a period of three months from September 2020 to November 2020 after approval from Institutional Review Board. Non probability convenience sampling technique was used, a total of 150 willing medical students 50 from each class (1, 2 and 3) were included in this study. The Data was collected by handing over “The 7item Generalized Anxiety Disorder Scale (GAD-7)” Perfprma, it was entered and then analyzed with SPSS version 23. Results: Total prevalence of stress and anxiety disorders in medical students was 81%, it was more prevalent in host élite 68.20% and in females 69%, the P-Value between female /male was 0.016 that is statistically significant. Th...

Levels of stress in medical students due to COVID-19

Journal of Medical Ethics, 2021

For medical schools, the COVID-19 pandemic necessitated examination and curricular restructuring as well as significant changes to clinical attachments. With the available evidence suggesting that medical students’ mental health status is already poorer than that of the general population, with academic stress being a chief predictor, such changes are likely to have a significant effect on these students. This online, cross-sectional study aimed to determine the impact of COVID-19 on perceived stress levels of medical students, investigate possible contributing and alleviating factors, and produce recommendations for medical schools to implement during future healthcare emergencies. The majority (54.5%) of respondents reported levels of stress ranging from moderate to extreme. Higher levels of stress were significantly associated with female gender (p=0.039) and international status (p=0.031). A significant association was also noted between reported stress and the transition to onl...

Prevalence of stress among medical students: a comparative study between public and private medical schools in Bangladesh

Background: Throughout the world all health professionals face stress because of time-pressures, workload, multiple roles and emotional issues. Stress does not only exist among the health professionals but also in medical students. Bangladesh has currently 77 medical colleges 54 of which are private. This study was designed to collect baseline data of stress-level among Bangladeshi students, which we believe will form the basis for further in depth studies. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted on medical students from 2 public and 6 private medical-schools in Bangladesh. All medical schools have common curriculum formulated by the Government of Bangladesh. The study population was 1,363 medical students of Year-III and IV of academic session 2013/2014. Universal sampling technique was used. The period of study was February to June 2014. Data was collected using a validated instrument, compiled and analysed using SPSS version-20. Results: A total of 990 (73%) out 1,363 medical students participated in the study, of which 36% were male and 64% were female. The overall prevalence of stress of the study population was 54%. 53% of male and 55% of female were reported suffering from stress. 54% of Year-III students and 55% of Year-IV were noted suffering from stress. There was statistically significant (p = 0.005) differences in the level of stress between public (2.84 ± 0.59) and private (2.73 ± 0.57) medical schools student. Conclusions: More than half of Bangladeshi medical students are suffering from measureable academic stress. It would be pertinent if the relevant authorities could address the issue so as to provide a conducive medical learning environment.

Association of COVID-19 Pandemic with undergraduate Medical Students’ Perceived Stress and Coping

Psychology Research and Behavior Management

The COVID-19 pandemic poses a major challenge for medical students' learning and has become a potential stressor, with a profound influence on their psychological wellbeing. We aimed to determine the effect of the current pandemic on undergraduate medical students' learning. We also explored the association of their stress level with coping strategies, educational, and psychological variables. Materials and Methods: This is a cross-sectional design study, and participants were the 1st to 5th year medical students. A self-administered questionnaire (18 items) and a well-known Kessler 10 Psychological Distress questionnaire (10 items) were used to collect the data related to perceived stress with an association of educational, psychological, and coping variables. Results: The prevalence of overall stress was significantly higher (χ 2 = 16.3; P=0.000) in female medical students, ie, (40%) as compared to the male students (16.6%), and was highest (48.8%) during the 3rd medical year. It was also noted that the most effective strategy, embraced by students to cope with the severe stress, was "indulging in religious activities" (OR= 1.08; P=0.81). Furthermore, 22.3% of students had perceived severe stress as they did not prefer online learning. Similarly, those students who have not believed or refused the online learning or disagree in "there is pleasure in the study due to COVID" they have significantly higher stress (χ 2 =39.7; P=0.000) 21.5% mild, 17.8% of moderate, and 21.2% severe. Conclusion: We found that the COVID-19 pandemic has induced stress and changes in medical students' educational attitudes and strategies. The results exhibited that the predominance of stress is higher in females than males, and also more stress was perceived by the students during their transitional year, ie, 3rd medical year (from pre-clinical to clinical) and also the respondents who regularly did religious meditation were at lower levels of stress. COVID-19's influence on medical education and students' well-being will be felt at an extended level, which necessitates an appropriate plan for preparedness.

The Prevalence of Stress Among Medical Students Studying an Integrative Curriculum During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Advances in Medical Education and Practice

Purpose: Stress is a psychological shift that negatively affects student achievement. We sought to investigate the extent of stress in the medical students at our university. Patients and Methods: A total of 337 medical students representing three program phases were represented. Stress was measured using a questionnaire divided into three main parts: 10question Kessler instruments, 10-questions specific to identifying the causes of stress, and a qualitative component to report additional information. For the Kessler questionnaire, a score of less than 20 was considered negative for stress of any level (alert) and scores of 20-24 were considered mild stress (resistance phase), 25-29 moderate stress (near exhaustion), and 30-50 severe stress (exhaustion). Descriptive studies in the form of mean, standard deviation, and confidence interval (CI) were used in addition to the chi-squared test for estimate significant differences between variables. A P-value of <0.05 was considered significant. Results: The prevalence of stress was 85.5%, with a slight male predominance. The prevalence of stress was seen among the male students during Phase I (88.25%), followed by male students during Phase III (87.7%), female students during phase II (86.5%), male students during phase II (84.5%), female students during phase I (83.3%) and female students during phase III (80.4%). Stress was uniformly high during phase I (86.2%) followed by phase II (85.4%) and phase III (85.1%), and 85% of stress was obtained from the number and content of assessments. Conclusion: There is a high level of stress throughout the curriculum. The number of assessments and the number of modules and their content are the primary sources of stress. Student mentorship, including academic, psychic, and social counseling, may help predict and manage stress and improve student performance. Detection of stress among the students is a major issue for program monitoring and development.

An Overview of Academic Stress Students of Medical Students of Mataram University for the 2020 Class in the Pandemic Era

Jurnal Ilmu Kesehatan, 2022

The Covid-19 pandemic has hit various countries in the world, including Indonesia, which has had a considerable impact on various fields, including the field of education. The government imposed the Large-Scale Social Restriction or PSBB policy solely to reduce the spread of the corona virus so that all activities carried out outside the home must be stopped until the Covid-19 pandemic subsides. As a result, the teaching and learning process must be carried out online from their respective homes in order to minimize the spread of Covid-19. Therefore, first year medical students are more susceptible to stress than second and third year students. This study aims to describe the stress level of pre-clinical first-year medical students at the University of Mataram. This study used a cross-sectional (cross-sectional) research method, namely research conducted by observing for a moment or within a certain period and each study subject only made 1 observation during the study. The number of samples in this study amounted to 115 people. The research instrument used was the Medical Student Stressor Questionnaire. Then the results of research based on the MSSQ questionnaire have 6 domains with stressors that dominate the highest stress levels are academic stressors 62 people (53.91%). In the stress level domain, the most dominant is severe stress with the domain having the highest level of severe stress being the academic stressor domain and the one having the highest light stress being the intrapersonal and interpersonal stressor domain, but severe stress still dominates.

Stressors Associated with Change in Academic and Social Attributes Due to COVID-19 Pandemic and Their Psychological Impact on Medical Students

Khyber Medical University Journal

OBJECTIVE: To identify the stressors related to academic online teaching and the change in social norms during the pandemic and to assess their psychological impact on the medical students. METHODS: A web based, descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted at Hazrat Bari Imam Sarkar Medical and Dental College, Islamabad Pakistan over a period of 4 months using an Online questionnaire via Google forms based on Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS21) scale comprising of 21 questions which address the depression, anxiety, and stress related questions. The modified questionnaire also contained open ended questions along with a short questionnaire based on 3 points Likert scale. RESULTS: Total of 305 subjects participated. Mean (±SD) severity score for Depression, anxiety and stress was 2.02± 1.3, 1.76±1.25 and 1.66±1.15 respectively. Highly significant positive correlation was observed between depression and stress score of subjects and history of COVID-19 infection in an acquain...