A Cross Sectional Study to Assess Prevalence, Pattern,Trend and Impact of Substance Abuse among Medical Students

Abstract

Background: Substance abuse remains a covert yet well known phenomenon among medicos and medical practitioners
globally, and Substance abuse assumes special significance among the medical students as they are the future medical
practitioners and have a potential role in treating and counselling[4] the patients of substance abuse disorder. Medical
education has always been regarded as highly stressful[5]. Although, only the academic minded youth in the society tend
to be selected for medical education, the stressful academic environment can exert a negative effect on the psychological
and physical well being of medical students. The doctors are vulnerable to Substance abuse due to their ready accessibility
to the substance .
Methods: A cross sectional study was conducted among 232 medical students of Karnataka Institute Of Medical Sciences
and various other medical colleges of Karnataka with the help of a structural questionnaire .
Conclusion: It is observed that majority of the participants have adequate knowledge and practices regarding substance
abuse. But some fraction of them indulged in substance abuse despite knowing their ill effects. They use various substances
such as alcohol, marijuana, cigarettes in various forms such as powders, inhalants, injections, liquid forms etc. However
trend towards increasing proportion of substance abuse was observed among students of medical field.The findings
suggest that substance abuse in medical students frequently precipitates severe lapses in professionalism and too often
endangers the life of not only the students who are using it but also the life of peers and others they may care for/treat
in the future.