A survey on anxiety and depression level among South Indian medical students during the COVID 19 pandemic

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic is being a global Heath crisis. The rate of transmission of the disease is very high. At this time there is no specific vaccine or treatment. This widespread outbreak is also associated with psychological distress like depression and anxiety. The effect of COVID 19 on medical students is considerable. The medical students are in a transitory period which could be one of the most stressful times in a person’s life. The aim of this study is to assess the mental health of South Indian medical students during the COVID-19 pandemic and to see if there is any influence of gender on mental health. A cross sectional study was conducted using convenient sampling method. A total of 359 responses were analysed. Anxiety and depression symptoms were assessed based on four point Likert scale. GAD-7 (General Anxiety Disorder-7) scale and CES-D (Center for Epidemiology Studies for Depression) scale is used to assess anxiety and depression symptoms with a small modification respectively. Data analysis was performed using IBM SPSS statistics version 25. Out of 359 participants 50.4% of participants were male and 49.6% of them were females; majority of them (95.3%) were between the age group of 18-21. In total 75.5% and 74.6% of participants showed varying levels of anxiety and depression symptoms respectively. Anxiety and depression symptoms are found to have a mild association with gender. Symptoms are slightly higher among females than males.