Positive correlation between irregular nutrition and the incidence of gastric dyspepsia in medical students

Abstract

Objective. To analyze the peculiarities of eating behavior and diet of medical students, to reveal the relationship between dietary habits and gastrointestinal symptoms. Materials and methods. A one-step anonymous survey of 996 students of 1-6 grades of the Chita State Medical Academy was carried out. The author’s questionnaire contained 53 questions concerning the peculiarities of the diet, the quality of the consumed products, as well as aimed at identifying gastrointestinal symptoms and hereditary factors in students. Statistical processing was carried out using the Statistica 10.0 program, correlation analysis was carried out using gamma correlation. Results. Only 40% of the respondents eat regularly at least 3 times a day. Almost 80% of students periodically skip meals at lunchtime, replacing it with a “snack on the run”: 45% 1-2 times a week, 24.8% 3-4 times a week, 9.4% daily during the school week. A positive correlation was found between the frequency of “snacking while running” per week with the frequency of pain (p = 0.0000001) and symptoms of gastric dyspepsia (p = 0.0000001). Only 57% of the respondents have breakfast. Abdominal pain 1-2 times a month and less was in 37.6% of respondents, 1-2 times a week - 26%, 3-4 times a week and more often - 7.4% and only 22% did not complain of pain in a stomach. Conclusion. Most of students have eating disorders that include inadequate breakfast, snack instead of lunch, lunch-dinner, and eating after 22:00. The relationship between the frequencies of eating disorders, fast food consumption, chips with gastrointestinal symptoms was revealed.