General health and its relation to the quality of life and alcohol consumption in a Polish cohort of medical students - preliminary results of POLLEK survey

• Published in: Frontiers in public health 2023-07, Vol.11, p.1178124-1178124
• Main Authors: Barański, Kamil, Szemik, Szymon, Kaleta-Pilarska, Angelina, Kowalska, Małgorzata
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: alcohol consumption; Alcohol Drinking - epidemiology; audit; Female; GHQ28; health; Humans; Male; medical students; Poland - epidemiology; Public Health; Quality of Life; Students, Medical; Surveys and Questionnaires; WHOQOL
• ISSN: 2296-2565; 2296-2565
• DOI: 10.3389/fpubh.2023.1178124

First-year students of medicine are at higher risk of stress related to the new environment and study overload. Such factors can play a role and have an impact on their quality of life and general health status which can cause possible problems with alcohol use. The aim of the study is to assess the relationship between mentioned factors in the Polish cohort of first-year medical students. The quality of life has been assessed within the WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire, the general health status was assessed via GHQ28, and alcohol consumption was assessed the by AUDIT questionnaire. Due to the lack of signature informed consent and lack of data, 381 (72%) students out of 525 were included in the final analysis. The majority of the 1-year students were females 68%; (  = 259) vs. 32% (  = 122) males. Half of the students had lowered risk of distress. However, females had a higher risk of having higher scores in GHQ-28 than males. In relation to the assessment of the quality of life, the students with a lower level of distress (