A Study to Assess the Level of Stress among Nursing Students in Selected Nursing Institutions of Karnataka, India

Abstract

Stress has been identified as a 21^st century disease and has been viewed as a complex and dynamic transaction between individuals and their environments. Academic stress among college students has been a topic of interest for many years. There is little empirical evidence about the level of stress suffered by nursing students and its impact on their health throughout clinical practice. Therefore, a study has undertaken to explore the level of stress among nursing students at selected nursing institutions of Bangalore City. Methods: The approach used for this study was exploratory research approach. Non-experimental descriptive design was used. A total of 100 first-year nursing students who met the inclusion criteria were selected by using non-probability convenient sampling technique. The tool consisted of two parts i.e. demographic profile and perceived stress scale. Individual scores on the perceived stress can range from 0 to 160 with higher scores indicating higher stress. Results: Majority of the subjects were female with the age group ranging from 17–18 years. The study reveals that overall mean stress score obtained by the subjects was 75.64 (47.27%) with standard deviation of 22.569, found to have moderate level of stress. Findings revealed that there was no statistically significant association between the stress score of first year nursing students with demographic variables such as age, gender, religion, family type, area of residence and source of information at the probability level of p<0.05. Conclusion: The study found moderate level of stress among nursing students in this setting. More studies are required to generalize the findings and plan for effective stress management interventions.