Comparative assessment of antibiotic resistance among first and second year undergraduate medical students in a tertiary care teaching hospital

Abstract

Background: Antibiotics are one of the commonest prescribing drugs in day to day practice. However indiscriminate and irrational use of antibiotics has given rise to the emergence of antibiotic resistance. Thus, intervention in the form of educating students and making them aware about this important concept should be initiated at the gross root level right from the beginning of medical profession. Objective was to assess the comparative awareness regarding antimicrobial resistance between first and second year MBBS students.Methods: This was a comparative, cross-sectional questionnaire based study. Two forty six undergraduate medical students, 118 students from 1st year and 129 students from 2nd year MBBS were included in the study to assess the extent of knowledge and about the problem of antibiotic resistance. Self-administered questionnaire was used to collect the data from respondents. The questionnaires of both the groups were analyzed for the responses of the students and were compared using student ‘t’ test and chi-square test.Results: Majority of the participants 63.6% and 72.9% had completed the full course of antibiotics as prescribed by the physician. Statistically significant difference (p<0.05) was found between the two groups where in 58.4% of the first year and 16.3% of the second year students were of the view that antibiotics can be used for viral illnesses. Only 44.1% students of first year knew the reasons for antibiotic resistance.Conclusions: It can be concluded from the present study that second year medical students were more aware regarding antimicrobial resistance as compared to first year MBBS students who represented the general public. Thus, it is very important to educate the students in a practical manner about this concept as they are the future health care givers who can promote the rational use of antibiotics in near future.

Assessment of knowledge, attitudes, and practices about antibiotic resistance among medical students in India

“…Similar level of awareness has been reported by Gupta et al (2019) among medical students in India. [27] Lower level of knowledge in this regard has also been reported by many other studies. [1017] Major source of information about antibiotic resistance for the first year students was internet, and for subsequent years it was through their academic course, followed by internet, general practitioners, newspaper, television, and discussions at home.…”

Antimicrobial resistance - are future prescribers aware? A study among undergraduate medical students in Kumaon region

“…flu) which is similar to previous studies Huang et al,Nisabwe et al,Scaioli et al,Khan et al,Sharma et al,and Padmanabha et al,6,[7][8][9][10][11] in a study conducted by Ganesh et al, (2014) 12 to assess knowledge of final year students in comparison to paramedical students and non-medical students found good knowledge among final year students. In Gupta et al, 13 found that 2 nd year students more aware about antibiotic resistance than 1 st year that is similar to present study that also showed more awareness among students belong to 3 rd and final year while other pervious study reported different results that more than 60% of their participants believed that antibiotics should be prescribed for viral illnesses. 14 Regarding source of information, majority of the participants (83%) heard about antibiotic resistance during the course of degree and by web platform (34.5%) which is less than previous study by Nisabwe et al, (2020), 7 and majority of them (94.3%) aware about antibiotic resistance and what will occur if miss use of antibiotic happen which is in line with Scaioli et al, (2015).…”

The impact of antibiotic resistance training programs on knowledge, attitude, and practice reflection among Indian higher education students

“…This finding contradicts a cluster of studies in which the primary source of information was the Internet [17,18]. Reflecting the conclusion of an earlier investigation conducted in India [19], a remarkable percentage of students used antibiotics after minor symptoms appeared. Overall, the training conducted within the framework of the project had the intended impact on the target group.…”