Anxiety and Depression at Resident Doctors in the Family Medicine Specialty

Abstract

Objective: identify anxiety and/or depression in Medical Residents specializing in Family Medicine (mrfm). Material and methods: observational, descriptive, cross-sectional, prospective study applied to mrfm of the Family Medicine Unit (fmu) no. 6 in Puebla, Mexico. Not randomized sample. Anxiety and depression were evaluated by using the Hamilton and the Beck tests respectively. The analysis was made through a descriptive statistic. Results: 56 residents in Family Medicine were studied, 41 (73.21%) female, and 15 (26.79%) male, with an average age of 30 years; 28 residents (50%) single at the time of the study. In relation to anxiety, there were 23 cases (41.1%), being low anxiety the most frequent with 9 cases (39.1%) in first year residents. In respect to depression, there were 11 cases (19.7%) identified with low depression, found mostly in second year residents with 5 cases (45.4%), and 6 (45.5%) were single. Conclusions: mrfm without any sign of anxiety and/or depression were the most frequent cases; residents who presented some kind of mood disorder, low level of anxiety and depression were the most frequent. A unsatisfied physician or exhausted gives a distant and limited medical care.