Assessment of Psychological Distress among B. Sc Nursing Students at SRM College of Nursing Devakani J. Selva Mary1,*, Jayabharathi B.2, Manonmani K.3, Lavanya L.3, Rajeshwari M.3 1Assistant Professor, SRM College of Nursing 2Professor, SRM College of Nursing 3B. Sc (N) Students, SRM College of Nursing, SRM Institute of Science and Technology *Corresponding author: Mrs. J. Selva Mary Devakani, Assistant Professor, SRM College of Nursing, SRM Institute of Science and Technology, Kattankulathur, Mob.: 9688541694, E-mail: selvamarydevakani@gmail.com
Online published on 12 July, 2019. Abstract Introduction Psychological distress has been widely used as an indicator of mental health. Psychological distress is a term used, both by some mental health practitioners and users of mental health services, to describe a range of symptoms and experiences of a person's internal life that are commonly held to be troubling, confusing or out of the ordinary. Objectives The objectives were (i) to assess the level of psychological distress among the nursing students ii) to find out the association between level of psychological distress among the nursing students with their socio demographic variables. Methodology The quantitative research approach and Non-Experimental descriptive design was adopted. The study was conducted with 181 samples of nursing students using Non probability convenient sampling technique. The study was conducted at SRM College of Nursing, Kattankulathur, Kancheepuram district. The data was analysed and interpreted based on the objectives using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results The results revealed that In B. Sc (N) I year, majority 27 (61%) of then had evidence of moderate psychological distress 14 (32%) of them had better mental health and 3 (7%) of them had severe problems with psychological distress. Among B. Sc (N) II year students, majority 29 (61%) of them had better mental health and 18 (39%) of then had evidence of moderate psychological distress. Among B. Sc (N) III year students, the majority 34 (77%) of them had better mental health and 10 (23%) had evidence of moderate psychological distress. Among B. Sc (N) IV year students, majority 40 (87%) of them had better mental health and only 6 (13%) had evidence of moderate psychological distress. Conclusion The results of the study concluded that psychological distress was increased in first year nursing students which was greatly reduced in final year nursing students. This study shows results that the imperative need to understand about level of psychological distress among nursing students. Top Keywords Psychological distress, mental health. Top |