ABSTRACT
Background: Medical students are prone to high levels of perceived stress and anxiety, which can negatively impact their academic performance, as well as their physical and mental health. This study aimed to assess the main stressors, levels of perceived stress and anxiety, and their predictors among medical students. Design and methods: A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 1696 medical students at Helwan University. A cross-sectional study was designed to evaluate their perceived stress, stressors, and anxiety using the Perceived Stress Scale, Medical Students Stressor Questionnaire, and Beck Anxiety Inventory, respectively. Results: Approximately 93% of medical students experienced moderate to high levels of stress, while 54.9% of medical students experienced moderate to concerning levels of anxiety. The main stressors were academic, teaching, social, intrapersonal, group activity, and desire-related stressors. Risk factors associated with higher perceived stress included being female, young age, living away from the family, obtaining lower academic percentages, having psychiatric, neurological, or other chronic medical illnesses, and experiencing higher levels of academic, intrapersonal, drive, and group activities-related stressors. Risk factors for higher anxiety included being female, residing in rural areas, having psychiatric, neurological, or other chronic medical illnesses, perceiving a high level of stress, and experiencing higher levels of academic, intrapersonal, and social-related stressors. Conclusions: The findings indicate that a significant proportion of medical students experience various levels of stress and anxiety. These results underscore the urgent need for a stress management program, to help medical students to cope with different stressors.
ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: Cognitive impairment is one of the fundamental features among patients with schizophrenia. The relationship between schizophrenia symptoms, insight and cognitive domains remains controversial. We aimed to study these relations in a sample of Egyptian patients with schizophrenia. METHODS: A total of 109 patients with schizophrenia were assessed using Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed.)) Axis I diagnosis (SCID-I), Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) and Scale to Assess Unawareness of Medical Disorder (SUMD). Cognitive functions were assessed using the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS), the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) and the Wechsler Memory Scale (WMS). The cognitive functions would be distributed to cover six cognitive domains: attention/vigilance speed of processing, verbal learning, visual learning, working memory and reasoning/problem solving. RESULTS: There was a significant correlation between all cognitive domains (except attention) and PANSS subscales. PANSS negative and general psychopathology subscales were significantly correlated with five cognitive domains: speed of processing, verbal learning, visual learning, working memory and reasoning/problem solving. PANSS negative subscale was significantly correlated with verbal learning (verbal paired association 1) and visual learning (visual paired association 1). There was a significant correlation between all cognitive domains and SUMD, except verbal and visual learning domains assessed by verbal and visual paired association 1 subtests, as well as attention assessed by failure to maintain set subtest. Only visual learning (trials administered), working memory (percentage error), and processing speed (perseverative responses, and trials to complete first category) were significantly negatively correlated to SUMD. CONCLUSION: Cognitive impairment in patients with schizophrenia is most likely to underlie negative symptoms, general psychopathology symptoms and poor insight, suggesting that treatment strategies minimizing these symptoms would improve cognitive impairment.