The Physicians’ Oath through the Eyes of the Bulgarian Medical Students: Empirical Survey

Abstract

Background Upon graduation physicians in Bulgaria are required by law to take the Hippocratic Oath and its’ different adapted variants are used in the medical schools. The goal of this survey was to investigate medical students’ in 4th, 5th and 6th year of their undergraduate training perception and preferences about the two versions: the adapted Hippocratic Oath currently used in one medical school (Version-1) and the newly-revised Declaration of Geneva “The Physician’s Pledge”, 2017 (Version-2). Methods An empirical survey was carried out, using direct individual self-administered questionnaire from February to April 2018. Students’ lists of total 239 medical students provided by the institution’s authority were used. 183 students responded (total response rate of 76.57%). Methods of descriptive and analytical statistics were used based on the nature of the data: relative frequency distributions, Pearson Chi-Square nonparametric test for hypothesis assessment – statistical significance was set at p<0.05. Results In a closed response binominal question force choice format respondents gave higher preference as overall perception to Version-1 (61.7%) and there were not statistically significant differences according to their basic socio-demographic characteristics (Pearson Chi-Square test - p> 0.05 for all hypotheses). The ranking of the clauses of the preferred version considered to be decisive indicated the highest preference to the wording in the two versions referring to the field of professional relationships in doctor-patient sphere: the doctor’s obligation to always be ready to provide medical care from the Version-1 (54.5%) and the nondiscrimination about the Version-2 (41.4%). In the particular aspect of the relations between teachers, students and colleges and the respect for human life, preferences were rather pointing to the wordings of the Version-2: respectively 54.4% and 63.2% of respondents and in the area of doctor-patient relationships greater preference was given to the wording of the Version-1: 59.3% of respondents. Conclusions The current survey was inspired by the latest revision of the Declaration of Geneva. There are the position expressed by the students towards both Oath versions as a bond between tradition and reality. Our finding could serve for further discussions regarding the Bulgarian practice of administering the Physicians’ Oath.

Effect of Microencapsulation on Antimicrobial and Antioxidant Activity of Nutmeg Oleoresin Using Mixtures of Gum Arabic, OSA, and Native Sorghum Starch

“…The DPPH radical scavenging activity of nutmeg microcapsules was determined by the method of Marinova & Batchvarov [20] with slight modifications. A hundred microliters of an extract were mixed with 2.9 mL of 0.1 mM DPPH-methanol solution.…”