The prevalence of depression among female medical students in Al-Maarefa Colleges in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Background: Depression is a mood disorder characterized by persistent low mood in which there is a feeling of sadness and loss of interest. Saudi Arabia has a large number of medical colleges with the majority of the students in private medical colleges and studies of such nature will be useful in addressing problems of depressed medical students in these institutions. This study aimed to study the prevalence of depression and to identify its related factors among female medical students in Al-Maarefa Colleges in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia during 2015-2016, and to determine the prevalence of depression among female medical students in different levels of educations. Methods: Sample size was 150 students and the population was the female medical students of Al-Maarefa Colleges. Results: It was found that 28.9% of the medical students were depressed. 44.7% of the study population was in level 7-8, and the majority of the participants were aged between 18-21 years. GPA was found to cause stress for 85.7% of the students and so the average 18-20hour/semester put 69.3% of the students under stress. Conclusion: The prevalence of depression was relatively low among the female medical students of Al-Maarefa Colleges during 2015-2015. The findings of the study showed negative associations between depression and students' marital status, parents' and partner's support, college satisfaction, self-esteem, classmates' negativity and GPA stress. Accordingly, it cannot be generalized that all medical students have depression.