Impact of psychiatry training on attitude of medical students toward mental illness and psychiatry

CONTEXT: Attitude of fresh graduates toward psychiatric patients is important to bridge the treatment gap due to mental illness. Psychiatry as a subject has been neglected in the undergraduates of MBBS. AIMS: (1) To compare the attitude of medical students and interns in a medical college toward mental illness and psychiatry. (2) To assess the impact of psychiatric training on attitude toward the mentally ill person and mental illness. SETTINGS AND DESIGN: Cross-sectional, single assessment study conducted at a tertiary hospital. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: Participants consisted of medical students of 1(st) and 2(nd) year who didn’t have any exposure to psychiatry and interns, who had completed their compulsory 2 week clinical posting in psychiatry. Participants were individually administered sociodemographic proforma, General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12), opinion about mental illness (OMI) scale, and attitude to psychiatry-29 (ATP-29) scale. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS: Standard descriptive statistics (mean, percentage), Chi-square test. RESULTS: A total of 135 participants formed the study sample, with 48, 47, and 40 participants from 1(st) year, 2(nd) year and interns, respectively. Mean GHQ score was 14.03 for the entire sample. There was better outlook of interns toward psychiatry and patients with mental disorders in comparison to fresh graduate students in some areas. Overall, negative attitude toward mental illness and psychiatry was reflected. CONCLUSIONS: Exposure to psychiatry as per the current curriculum seems to have a limited influence in bringing a positive change in OMI and psychiatry.