ABSTRACT
Objective
To study mental and physical health of undergraduate medical students at various stages of traditional subject based curriculum.
Methods
A cross-sectional survey was conducted on medical students (n=110) in a private medical college of Islamabad in May 2006. SF-36, a validated instrument for mental and physical health assessment, was used. Responses were decoded as per SF-36 analysis protocol. Standardized Cronbach’s alpha was done as a test of reliability. The survey was filled by the participant anonymously and submission of the filled questionnaire was taken as consent. All hypotheses were tested at the 0.05 level of significance using 2 tailed statistics.
Results
Out of 200 survey forms sent, 110 were returned from all classes. Standardized Cronbach’s alpha was 0.89. Analysis of variance revealed that physical functioning, general health perceptions, vitality and social functioning for 2nd year students were significantly less than rest of the four classes while Role Limitations because of Physical Problems and Role Limitations because of Emotional Problems for 2nd year class were significantly low when compared with year 1, 3 and 5. Bodily pain and mental health for 2nd year students were significantly (P
Key words: HRQL, medical students, stress, curriculum.
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