Abstract

KNOWLEDGE, ATTITUDE AND PRACTICE ABOUT RESEARCH AND RESEARCH ETHICS AMONG UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS IN A TERTIARY CARE HOSPITAL

Rajesh Mailagire*, Minal Jain and Rajesh S. Hiray

ABSTRACT

Background: Research plays an essential role in subject understandingand practising evidence-based medicine. With the new medicalcurriculum and increased focus on skill-based learning there is increasein the significance of research and research ethics, in theundergraduates. Thus, this study was undertaken to assess knowledge,attitude and practices regarding research and research ethics in medicalundergraduates and to study the barriers they faced while conductingresearch. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional, observationalquestionnaire-based study was conducted in undergraduate medicalstudents of a government medical college for a period of 3 months.Validated questionnaires were administered to assess the studentdemographics, knowledge, attitude, practice and barriers in research.Data was compiled in MS Excel and analysed using descriptivestatistics. Results: A total of 120 students responded, 54.17% females and 45.83% males.The overall knowledge score was 71.49%. A positive attitude towards research was observed,however only 14.2% students had actually participated in any kind of scientific research.Barriers encountered by students were time constraints (16.14%), difficulties in selectingresearch topics (15.70%) and finding mentors (13.23%), lack of funding (11.88 %) andlimited access to database for research (8.52 %). Conclusion: It was noted that students had fairly good knowledge and a positive inclination towards research. However, activeparticipation was hampered due to certain obstacles which if removed can immenselyincrease the number of research activities done by medical undergraduates.

Keywords: Medical undergraduates, scientific research, awareness.