Tropical Journal of Pharmaceutical Research

Original Research Article | OPEN ACCESS

Determinants of academic stress and stress-related self-medication practice among undergraduate male pharmacy and medical students of a tertiary educational institution in Saudi Arabia

Muhammad Abdullah Al-Shagawi¹, Rizwan Ahmad² , Atta Abbas Naqvi³, Niyaz Ahmad⁴

¹Department of Pharmacy Practice; ²Department of Natural Products and Alternative Medicines; ³Department of Pharmacy Practice; ⁴Department of Pharmaceutics, College of Clinical Pharmacy, Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Dammam 31441, Saudi Arabia.

For correspondence:- Rizwan Ahmad Email: rizvistar_36@yahoo.com

Accepted: 20 November 2017 Published: 29 December 2017

Citation: Al-Shagawi MA, Ahmad R, Naqvi AA, Ahmad N. Determinants of academic stress and stress-related self-medication practice among undergraduate male pharmacy and medical students of a tertiary educational institution in Saudi Arabia. Trop J Pharm Res 2017; 16(12):2997-3003 doi: 10.4314/tjpr.v16i12.26

© 2017 The authors.
This is an Open Access article that uses a funding model which does not charge readers or their institutions for access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) and the Budapest Open Access Initiative (http://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read), which permit unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited..

Abstract

Purpose: To identify factors that promote academic stress and stress-related self-medication practice among undergraduate male students of pharmacy and medical colleges at Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Dammam, Saudi Arabia.

Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among undergraduate students of pharmacy and medical colleges of the university. The study used Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) to document academic stress. The responses of the students were analyzed using SPSS version 22.

Results: As many as 51.6 % of students’ perceived moderate stress. The majority of students (55.9 %) highlighted examination as a stressor followed by course load (43.2 %) and cGPA (40.4 %). Prevalence of self-medication was 31.58 and 29.20 % among pharmacy and medical students, respectively. Most of the students consumed caffeine (63.8 %) and nicotine (17.8 %) as a drug. Students blamed heavy course load (23.9 %), followed by assignment load (23 %) and examination (21.1 %) for indulging in self-medication.

Conclusion: Academic stress in undergraduate students in health disciplines is perceived to be high by the students. Examinations, course load and lack of time for leisure are major determinants of stress. Caffeine and nicotine are most frequently used by a majority of the students for self-medication

Keywords: Stress, Self-medication, Stressor, Caffeine, Nicotine, Students