Journal of Indian Academy of Forensic Medicine

Alcohol consumption has been recognized as one of the prevalent methods of stress-reduction among national and international medical students. The present study is a questionnaire based cross sectional mono-centric one, conducted in 3 batches of medical students of a semi urban teaching institute of West Bengal. The purpose of this study is to find out the prevalence of alcohol abuse including underlying cause of alcohol intake among medical students & its consequences. Data are analyzed by In Stat Graph pad 3.4 version. P values < 0.05 are considered as significant. This study reveals out of total 244 participants, 87 (35.66%) students consumed alcohol at least once in a life time with a male preponderance. Strong relationships exist between alcohol abuse and stress and depression in the students. Family history of alcohol consumption & living in hostel are two other factors accountable for alcohol use. Most of the alcohol users are just occasional drinker. In most cases, there is no deterioration of academic performances or relationship with parents or no adverse behavioral changes. Findings of this study will be of potential interest since today's medical students will become tomorrow's health promoters.