Attitude of intern towards psychiatry

Abstract

Background: With the rising mental health disorders in India and the limited number of psychiatrists, it is important that mental health care is made available at the primary care level. For this, it is important that the future doctors develop a positive attitude toward mental illnesses and their care. Aim: This study aims to analyze the attitude of the interns toward psychiatric and get feedback about the current undergraduate psychiatric education and training. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted among interns pursuing their internship at a government hospital in Southern India. Data were collected using a Google form that included demographic data, semi-structured questionnaire, and attitude towards psychiatry-30 questionnaire. Results: The 203 valid entries were received. An overall positive attitude was seen. Indian medical graduates had a significantly more positive attitude than foreign medical graduates. Even after attending posting, a major 55% felt incompetent to provide primary care to common psychiatric cases and 67% felt they did not had adequate exposure to make a career choice in psychiatry. Of all the interns, 80% felt that the current 2 weeks' posting is inadequate for clinical learning, 90% would like to have a more dedicated course. Although the positive impact of the mandatory posting during the internship is evident, its duration seemed inadequate. Conclusion: The growing willingness to learn more about psychiatry, as seen in this study, seems to be the right chance for intervention to bring in more effective learning tools and provide an appropriate duration to learn psychiatry.

Keywords

• attitude
• foreign medical graduates
• interns
• psychiatry