Factors associated to depression and anxiety in medical students: a multicenter study
Open accessAbstract
BACKGROUND: To evaluate personal and institutional factors related to depression and anxiety prevalence of students from 22 Brazilian medical schools. METHODS: The authors performed a multicenter study (August 2011 to August 2012), examining personal factors (age, sex, housing, tuition scholarship) and institutional factors (year of the medical training, school legal status, location and support service) in association with scores of Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and State Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI). RESULTS: Of 1,650 randomly selected students, 1,350 (81.8 %) completed the study. The depressive symptoms prevalence was 41 % (BDI > 9), state-anxiety 81.7 % and trait-anxiety in 85.6 % (STAI > 33). There was a positive relationship between levels of state (r = 0,591, p < 0.001) and trait (r = 0,718, p < 0.001) anxiety and depression scores. All three symptoms were positively associated with female sex and students from medical schools located in capital cities of both sexes. Tuition scholarship students had higher state-anxiety but not trait-anxiety or depression scores. Medical students with higher levels of depression and anxiety symptoms disagree more than their peers with the statements "I have adequate access to psychological support" and "There is a good support system for students who get stressed". CONCLUSIONS: The factors associated with the increase of medical students' depression and anxiety symptoms were female sex, school location and tuition scholarship. It is interesting that tuition scholarship students showed state-anxiety, but not depression and trait-anxiety symptoms.
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Anxiety and depression disorders are highly prevalent in medical students.
“The high prevalence of anxiety and depression disorders in this group has been clearly established,3,4”
From Improved quality of life and reduced depressive symptoms in medical students after a single-session intervention (2020) · cites this paper as [4]
The Background describes a high prevalence of anxiety and depression among medical students, and the Discussion reports high rates in the Brazilian sample. However, the study measured depressive and anxiety symptoms using questionnaires, not the prevalence of diagnosed disorders; that distinction limits support for the citing sentence. (LLM, conf=0.84)
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- Authors
- Brenneisen Mayer, F., Souza Santos, I., Silveira, P. S. P., Itaqui Lopes, M. H., de Souza, A. R. N. D., Campos, E. P., de Abreu, B. A. L., Hoffman II, I., Magalhães, C. R., Lima, M. C. P., Almeida, R., Spinardi, M., & Tempski, P.
- Affiliations
- Universidade de São Paulo (BR)
- Centro Universitário Serra dos Órgãos (BR)
- Universidade Federal de Ciências da Saúde de Porto Alegre (BR)
- Universidade Estadual Paulista (Unesp) (BR)
- Universidade Federal de Rondônia (BR)
- Faculdade de Medicina de Marília (BR)
- Venue
- BMC Medical Education
- Published
- 2016-10-26
- Volume
- 16
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 282-282
- ISSN
- 1472-6920 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC5080800
- OpenAlex
- W2533046279
- Cited by
- 364
- References
- 61
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 36 · 2024: 51 · 2023: 44 · 2022: 59 · 2021: 48 · 2020: 60 · 2019: 27 · 2018: 16 · 2017: 4 · 2015: 1
- FWCI
- 29.18
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- BMC Medical Education (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Portuguese National Funding Agency for Science, Research and Technology (RCAAP Project by FCT) (publishedVersion)
- Americanae (AECID Library) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- LA Referencia (Red Federada de Repositorios Institucionales de Publicaciones Científicas) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Funders
- CAPES (Brazilian Federal Agency for the Support and Evaluation of Graduate Education)
- CNPq (National Council for Scientific Development)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Healthcare professionals’ stress and burnout
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Mental Health Treatment and Access
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Student Stress and Coping
- Keywords
- depression, anxiety, medical students, state anxiety, trait anxiety, depression prevalence, sex differences, school location, psychological support services, medical education
- MeSH terms
- Anxiety, Brazil, Depression, Fellowships and Scholarships, Female, Humans, Male, Schools, Medical, Sex Factors, Students, Medical, Prevalence, Young Adult
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