Journal of Research in Medical Education & Ethics

Medical education in postgraduates is seemingly an endless sequence of vast workload and educational course compacted in a short duration with an alarming increase in emotional and physical stress among medical students. There are few studies in this context and hence we decided to study self-reported depression, stress and sleep patterns among resident doctors.

236 residents were contacted, 200 consented, and 140 completely filled proformas were analysed with 47, 51 and 42 medical postgraduate students in their 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd years of residency programme, respectively, in a tertiary care hospital. A specially prepared proforma with questions pertaining to the demographic profile, sleep patterns and the aims of the study with scales such as Beck's Depression Inventory and Student Life Stress Inventory were given to the postgraduate students. The collected data was tabulated and statistically analysed.

25% of the residents were depressed with increased prevalence and severity in 3^rd year of residency. Female preponderance for self-reported depression was seen. The 1st and 3rd year residents experienced more stressors like conflicts, self-imposed stressors and had more reactions to stressors. Surprisingly majority of the residents experienced adequate sleep of 6 to 8 hours, and in those having less than 6 hours of sleep, an association with depressive symptoms was noted.

This study highlights the presence of stress in the medical postgraduate students and gives information regarding various stressors experienced by them in the residency programme. It emphasizes on the need for preventive measures to be considered to reduce the same.