Stigmatization of medical school students towards schiczophrenia: A qualitative study

The objective of this qualitative is to describe and clarify, via focused group discussions, the stigmatization related to schizophrenia and the underlying behaviours, beliefs and attitudes of medical faculty students.

 This study was conducted among Marmara University School of Medicine first and sixth year students. Focused group discussions were performed with a minimum of 5 and a maximum of 8 students. Five discussions were performed with each main (first year and sixth year) group; summing up to a total of ten discussions. A total of 62 students (39 male and 23 female) took part in the discussions. The discussions were analyzed using theme analysis.

 During the discussions, it was observed that first year students were aware of schizophrenia; but, their way of describing the disease was mainly based on the experiences they had gone through or on the paradigms of visual and auditory illusions. The terms “mental health” and “spiritual health” were being used interchangeably. They were holding the traumatic events accountable for the etiology of the disease and their approach to the patients showed indications of  being worried about the harm or damage likely to be caused by the patients and fear caused by this concern. They believed therapies could be more efficient than drugs in schizophrenia treatment. Sixth year students believed that the etiology of schizophrenia was multi-factorial (genetic, organic causes etc). Their approach to the schizophrenic patient was frosty and they had opinions indicating drug therapies were safe.

 These findings show the importance of evaluation and comprehension of schizophrenia by today’s medical students (who are the physicians of the future). It was observed that medical students mainly evaluated schizophrenia similar to the way the society does and showed implications of stigmatization related to the disease.

 Stigmatization, schizophrenia, medical students, qualitative study, focus group discussion.