Burnout and stress in medical students in France: prevalence and associated factorsJoel Ladner

MP Tavolacci, B Veber School of Medicine, University of Rouen, Rouen, France Contact: joel.ladner@univ-rouen.fr Introduction Medical students experience stress and burn out, and mental illness at a higher rate than the general population, with mental health deteriorating over the course of medical training. The objective was to characterize the burn out and stress and to identify associated factors among medical students. Methods In 2013, a cross-sectional study was conducted in medical students in pre graduation (from 4th to 6th). In France, at the end of the 6th year, there is the National Ranking Examination related to heavy workloads for its preparation. An anonymous self-administered questionnaire collected information on sex, age, daily working time for studies. The level of stress was measured used the scale of Cohen (on a total of 40). The burn out was measured using the Maslach scale (MBI) address three scales: emotional exhaustion (ES) used for burn out assessment, depersonalization and personal accomplishment. Results A total of 542 students were included (response rate: 88.0%), including 388 students in 4th and 5th year and 3 and 154 students in 6th year (28.4%) The mean age was 23.1 years (SD = 1.6), sex ratio M:W = 0.73. The average stress was 18.0 (SD = 6.6) among 4th and 5th students and 19.4 (SD = 6.9) in the 6th year students (p = 0.03). In the 6th students, 33.6% presented a high level of burn out versus 27.5% in 4th and 5th students (p = 0.004). Depersonalization and personal accomplishment were not significantly different between the two groups. A high level of burn out was significantly associated with stress (AOR = 1.45, 95% CI = 1.35-1.53; p < 10-4) and working hours (AOR = 1.13, 95% CI = 1.05-1.19; p = 0.002) Conclusion The prevalence of burn out is high among medical students, especially for those in 6th year, preparing the national examination. Burn out can have personal and professional consequences. These results suggest that new approaches may be needed to reduce the stigma of depression and to enhance its prevention, detection, and treatment. 8th European Public Health Conference: Parallel Sessions 161