Health anxiety among medical students: A comparison between preclinical and clinical years of training

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: It is common among medical students to falsely attribute bodily sensations/symptoms and holds a belief of having a medical illness with varying level of conviction. We studied and compared this condition known as “medical student syndrome”, a type of hypochondriasis, between preclinical and clinical years students. METHODOLOGY: This research was a descriptive study where a total of 100 students were approached and were asked to complete a short form of health anxiety inventory (SHAI) which has Cronbach's alpha 0.855. No personal identifiers were included in the study questionnaires. All statistical analyses were performed using the SPSS statistical software package (IBM SPSS Statistics Version 23, SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA). RESULTS: The response rate among participants was 88% (42 from preclinical and 48 from clinical years of training). Health-related anxiety (SHAI main section score ≥ 18) was found in 14.77% of students with a higher proportion in preclinical than clinical, 16.66% and 13.04%, respectively. The difference was not significant between the two groups ( χ 2 = 0.429 [1], P = 0.766). Students having medical professional in family had lower rate of health-related anxiety, χ 2 (1, n = 88) = 0.228, P = 0.633. The association between family or personal history of psychiatry or medical illness was not significant with SHAI scores. No relation was noted between current health anxiety (SHAI score) and the number of visits to the doctor per year before entering the medical course (χ = 0.174, P = 0.112). CONCLUSION: Every seventh medical student was found to have health-related anxiety. It was not affected by personal and family history of either psychiatric or medical illness.

Cyberchondria, Anxiety Sensitivity, Hypochondria, and Internet Addiction: Implications for Mental Health Professionals

“…Consistent with previous findings, anxiety sensitivity was positively, significantly, and highly associated with hypochondria (Boysan et al, 2017 ; Fawaz & Samaha, 2021 ; Guo et al, 2020 ; Jhanwar et al, 2021 ; Starcevic et al, 2020a , b ). This finding suggests that being preoccupied with the irrational belief of over-focusing on somatic functions may be a risk factor for developing hypochondria and misinterpreting symptoms as a critical disease.…”

“…A recent meta-analysis study showed that people who experience compulsive use of the Internet exhibit cyberchondria behaviors and increased health-related anxiety levels (McMullan, Berle, Arnaez, & Starcevic, 2019 ). A better understanding of the magnitude and direction of the correlations between students’ characteristics and growing hypochondria enables them to manage their anxieties (Jhanwar et al, 2021 ). Previous literature has studied each concept apart (Jokic-Begic et al, 2020 ; Hashemi et al, 2020 ; Selvi et al, 2018 ; Siste et al, 2021 ; Starcevic & Berle, 2013 ).…”

“…The Internet has become a significant source of information among students experiencing cyberchondria (Bati et al, 2018 ), allowing them to do continuous research on their perceived health conditions. Ongoing and exaggerated Internet use can be detrimental to the psychological health of the Internet user (Hashemi et al, 2020 ; Guo et al, 2020 ; Jhanwar et al, 2021 ; Selvi et al, 2018 ). Adverse health conditions associated with excessive Internet use may include physical or emotional distress, anxiety, depression, and eventual addiction to the Internet (Zeng et al, 2019 ).…”

“…Many students are increasingly looking for all forms of online information, especially after the rapid improvement of Internet connectivity. Research has shown that at least 50% of Internet users searched for online health-related information, with 56% having self-medical diagnoses using information available online (Deetjen, 2017 ; Jhanwar et al, 2021 ). Searching for online medical-related information may be accompanied by distress with profound consequences for users, such as Internet addiction, hypochondria, and anxiety sensitivity (Guo et al, 2020 ).…”

A comparative study to assess hypochondrial attitude among nursing and other department students of Eternal University Baru Sahib, Himachal Pradesh

“…The results shows that the health science students had higher health anxiety compare to non-health science students. 11 In our study the heath related anxiety or hypochondrial attitude is higher among nursing students as compare to other department students. The finding is congruent with the previous studies wherein the medical students have higher hypochondrial attitude and health related anxiety as compare to other department students.…”