Dental environment and war-related stress among dental students, Yemen

Background: Education related to health sciences appears to be the most stressful. Aims: The aim of this study was to evaluate the perceived stress among Yemeni dental students and to explore the effect of the war circumstances on the perceived stress. Methods: This cross-sectional study targeted all dental students at the two main dental faculties in Yemen. Dental environmental stress questionnaire was used. An extra 12 items (as one domain) were developed to reflect the stress resulting from the current war circumstances. Results: A total of 1051 dental students participated in this study. The overall dental environmental stress was 1.63±0.45. The most significant stressor domain was "workload", followed by "war-related" along with "performance pressure". In general, females, married, and clinical students, and those with lower GPA scored significantly higher stress levels than their counterparts. Regression analysis revealed that the university, sex, and study level as the most significant determinants for most domains. Resultats: Un total de 1051 etudiants en medecine dentaire ont participe a cette etude. Globalement, le stress en environnement dentaire etait de 1,63±0,45. La charge de travail constituait le facteur de stress le plus important, suivie par le facteur lie a la guerre ainsi que la pression en termes de performance. En general, les femmes mariees et les etudiants en medecine clinique ainsi que ceux dont la moyenne ponderee etait plus faible presentaient un niveau de stress significativement plus eleve que leurs camarades. L’analyse de regression a montre que l’universite, le sexe et le niveau d’etude constituaient les determinants les plus importants dans la plupart des domaines. Conclusions: Le niveau de stress parmi les etudiants en medecine dentaire yemenites est considere comme etant modere a eleve. Ce stress etait encore aggrave par la situation de guerre que connait ce pays. الاستنتاجات: يمكن اعتبار مستوى الإجهاد بين طلاب الأسنان اليمنيين متوسطا إلى مرتفعا. وتفاقم هذا الإجهاد بسبب ظروف الحرب هناك.