General Health Status of Undergraduate Students of CVASU and Its Relationship to Sleep quality, Social Network and Internet Addiction- A Cross-sectional study

Abstract

Students are future of a nation. The system of education has been changing worldwide with introduction of various modern facilities. The socio-demographic information, general health characteristics of students, addiction to social networks and quality of sleep are important parameters for sound health. In Bangladesh, studies on the above-mentioned parameters of the students are very much limited. Considering these factors, the present study was undertaken at Chattogram Veterinary and Animal Sciences University among veterinary medicine students to assess their overall general health conditions for a period of six months from July to December, 2022. A total of 156 undergraduate Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) students in two semester 2nd (n=75) and 6th semester (n=81) were brought under this study. After taking consent a survey was conducted with a pre-structure questionnaire with the following parameters such as socio-demographic information, life style and behavior, general health characteristics, general health questionnaire-28 (somatic symptoms, anxiety and insomnia, severe depression, social dysfunction), social network addiction scale, young internet addiction test total score, Pittsburgh sleep quality index, and Global PSQI score. The obtained data were analyzed for the descriptive statistics and student t test were performed using SPSS version-23. A p<0.05 was considered as significant. There were 71% male and 29% female student. The mean age of the student is 21.88 years with a range between 19-26 years. Of the total 56.4% students came from rural areas, and 0.6% from abroad, 65.5% students live in hostel and mess, 80.6% came from joint family, 53.5% students financial support given by their parents, 2% students had smoking habits, 43.5% students consume coffee during day time, 67% students have allergy to smoke/dust, 70.6% students take food in the hostel and 1.3% in the mess, 16.3% students’ academic performance is good and 2% students have no spiritual habit. The mean BMI was 24.1(range, 16.76-32.46 m/kg2). GHQ-28 study revealed that 32% students have somatic symptom above 4 (indicates distressed condition) and 21.8% students have anxiety and insomnia, 11% have depression, and 38.5% have social dysfunction. Severe depression was found significantly higher in 6th semester students (p<0.026) than 2nd semester students and social dysfunction was found higher in male than female (p<0.003). Overall mean score of social networking addiction scale score is 83.85% of which 55.9% students have severe social networking addiction. Overall mean young internet addiction test total score scale is 47.34 and this addiction was higher in 2nd semester students as compared to 6th semester student (p<0.000) and the average mean score of Global PSQI score is 5.47. In summary, we may conclude that significant severe depression found in 6th semester students while social dysfunction significantly found in male students.