PREVALENCE OF STRESS AMONG PHYSICAL THERAPY STUDENTS: A COMPARATIVE STUDY BETWEEN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES

BACKGROUND Stress may lead to hypertension, tachycardia and hormonal variations; it has both positive and negative effects on human body to cope up with the destructive responses of distress that alters the internal and external environment of the body OBJECTIVES To assess the prevalence of stress among the undergraduate DPT students of private and public sector universities of Karachi Pakistan. METHODOLOGY A cross-sectional survey was conducted among the undergraduate Doctor of Physical Therapy students of public and private sector universities. Random sampling technique was used for enrolment of participants. The data was collected from 318 students through Student Stress Inventory (SSI) tool and analyzed on SPSS version 20. RESULTS The prevalence of stress among the participants was 11.5% from Karachi University, 55.0 % from Ziauddin University and 33.3% from JPMC. Total participants included were 261 females and 51 males. Around 53.8% were suffering from moderate stress, 25.8% with mild stress. Moreover public and private sector stress level lie at moderate category CONCLUSION The study revealed that moderate level of stress was found among the majority of undergraduate DPT students. The stress level in private sector is calculated as 55.0 % where as 44.9% is found in public sector.