Document Type : Research Paper
Authors
1
Assistant Professor, Department of basic sciences, Faculty of Medicine, Mashhad Medical Sciences, Islamic Azad University, Mashhad, Iran
2
Department of cardiology, Mashhad university of medical sciences, Mashhad, Iran
3
Department of surgery, Faculty of Medicine, Mashhad Medical Sciences, Islamic Azad University, Mashhad, Iran
4
Department of Psychology, Faculty of Medicine, Mashhad Medical Sciences, Islamic Azad University, Mashhad, Iran
Abstract
Introduction: Doctor-patient relation and mutual understanding lead to positive results such as motivating patients to follow instructions carefully, increasing the quality of care and treatment and improving patient outcomes and reducing costs. On the other way an empathetic approach in the clinical environment can lead to an increase in clinical competence, professional satisfaction, increase in accuracy and feeling of success in treatment, decrease in medical errors in doctors. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the improvement of empathy skills in medical students and seeks to answer the question, do medical students experience emotional pain during their studies?
Method: This descriptive-analytical study was conducted on all first and last year students studying medicine in 1401 at Islamic Azad University of Mashhad Medical Sciences Branch. The study tool was the Persian version of the Jefferson Questionnaire, which includes 20 questions on a Likert scale and scores 100-20. After completing the questionnaires, the data was analyzed with SPSS software.
Results: 180 first and last year medical students were examined. The average score of empathy in first and last year students was 75.71 ± 8.1 and 73.73 ± 9.09 respectively, which is statistically significant (u=275.5, P-Value<0 /001).
Conclusion: Empathy in medical students decreases at the end of the university period, so the development of empathy should be considered in clinical education by medical education planners. Also, student support systems and mental health should be considered.
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