Study of depressive, anxiety, and stress symptoms and their associated risk factors among undergraduate nursing students in central India: A cross-sectional study

Abstract

Background: Assessment of mental health of undergraduate Indian nursing students using Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21) and determination of associated potential risk factors. Aims: The aim of the study was to find the prevalence of depressive, anxiety, and stress symptoms among undergraduate nursing students, in a tertiary care teaching hospital in Central India. The study also aimed to find out potential risk factors associated with depressive, anxiety, and stress symptoms in the study population. Methodology: The study was an analytical, cross-sectional, questionnaire-based study done on undergraduate nursing students at a tertiary care teaching hospital in Central India. Data about depressive, anxiety, and stress symptoms was collected by administering the DASS-21 questionnaire, to the participating individuals in English language. Prevalence of depressive, anxiety, and stress symptoms was done described in percentages. Binomial logistic regression analysis was done to find out factors associated with moderate-to-severe grade of symptoms. Results: Our study shows the prevalence of moderate to very severe depressive symptoms to be 34.1%. Similarly, prevalence of moderate to very severe anxiety and stress symptoms was found to be 61.9% and 17.7%, respectively. On doing binomial logistic regression analysis, family relationship was found to be significantly associated with depressive (P = 0.00, odds ratio [OR] 0.638 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.877–0.464]) and stress (P = 0.002, OR 0.582 [95% CI 0.822–0.412]) symptoms. Similarly, adequate friend support was found to be significantly associated with anxiety (P = 0.04, OR 0.785 [95% CI 0.923–0.602]) and stress symptoms (P = 0.007, OR 0.645 [95% CI 0.885–0.469]). Conclusion: Our study concludes that the prevalence of depression, anxiety, and stress symptoms among nursing students is alarmingly high. In our study, lack of healthy family relations and lack of friend support were found to be two main risk factors associated with depression, anxiety, and stress. There is a need to acknowledge the mental health issues of nursing students and to devise strategies to tackle them efficiently.