Stress management strategies among medical students

Introduction: Stress doesn't only exist among professionals but also among medical students who undergo high ranked stress due to study burden. Although some degree of stress is assumed as a normal part of medical training and can serve as motivating factor but not all students find the stress manageable. Stress may give rise to feelings of fear, incompetence, hopelessness, anger, and guilt and has been associated with both psychological and physical / physiological disorders. We need to explore most effective and healthy coping strategies for the medical students. Objective: The purpose of this study was to identify key stressors by assessing the aptitude for language (English), stress, anxiety level among medical students and to explore the most effective stress management strategies. Materials and Methods: 185 medical students i.e., 91 MBBS and 94 BDS students. For above purpose measures used were Differential Aptitude Test (DAT) for language (English), Cohen's Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), Sinha`s Anxiety Scale (SAS) and Stress Coping Checklist (SCC). Result and Discussions: Students were found to be moderately stressed and anxious but found to have adequate English aptitude, grammatical part was found to be questionable. Stress coping level was adequate being in 1ST year and most useful stress coping strategies were listed. Conclusion: Stress is really exerting element for all of us but the students who are involved in higher studies specifically medical entrants are needed to be identified, guided and supported with immediate effects.