Psychiatric Symptoms in Dental Students

Prior research has suggested that dentistry is a relatively stressful occupation that may place its practitioners at an increased mental health risk. Whether or not this susceptibility to mental distress is also evident in those who are being educated to enter the occupation has not been previously studied. The purpose of the present study was to examine the presence of psychiatric symptomatology in a sample of dental students by using the Hopkins Symptom Checklist. Results indicate that dental students evidenced considerably higher symptom levels than those previously reported in a general population survey. Compared with the general population, dental students showed a mild elevation in somatic symptomatology, a moderate elevation in anxiety and depressive symptomatology, and a marked elevation in obsessive-compulsive symptomatology and interpersonal sensitivity. It is possible that the marked elevations in obsessive-compulsive symptomatology and in interpersonal sensitivity may reflect in part a sensitization to excessive performance demands. This sensitization may manifest itself in cognitive inefficiencies such as indecisiveness, blocking or memory impairment, and excess sensitivity to the evaluative judgments of other people. In comparing dental students with other sample groups, dental students were also found to evidence more psychiatric symptomatology than general medical patients judged free of psychiatric illness, and to approach levels of symptomatology found in general medical patients judged psychiatrically ill or in need of psychiatric treatment. Dental students were also found to evidence a level of symptomatology very similar to that previously reported in a large sample of medical students at the same institution. Dental students clearly did not evidence as much symptomatology as that found in identified psychiatric outpatients suffering from anxiety or depressive disorders. In other analyses, students from each of the four dental school classes were compared, and there was no significant relationship between the year in school of the student and the symptom level reported. In examining sex differences, women reported a significantly higher level of total symptomatology and significantly higher symptom levels on four of the five subscales. The largest sex differences occurred in the symptom areas of depression and anxiety. An examination of the ethnic backgrounds of students also revealed significant differences as individuals from non-black, non-Hispanic minority groups showed high symptom levels. Levels of psychiatric symptomatology were also significantly related to a measure of perceived stress. Results clearly indicate that further attention to the mental health needs of dental students is warranted.