Effect of an Intervention Package on the Medical Students’ Stigma towards Patients with Psychiatric Disorders

Background: The present study aimed at investigating the effect of a stigma reduction intervention package on improving the attitude of medical students towards patients with patients with psychiatric disorders. Methods: The authors included medical students at the Iran Psychiatric Hospital in the study and divided them into two intervention and control groups using cluster randomization method. In addition to regular psychiatric training, the intervention group was trained with a package that included watching a film, stigma awareness workshop, and direct social contact with patients with psychiatric disorders; each followed by group discussions. The outcome measures were assessed three times; before, immediately after, and three months after the intervention, using the Social Distance Scale (SDS), Dangerousness Scale (DS), and the short form of Opening Minds Scale for Health Care (OMS-HC). Results: 74 filled all the questionnaires in all three times; the intervention group included 39 and the control group included 35 students. In one-month follow-up, stigma among the participants decreased according to OMS-HC and DS questionnaires as the difference between stigma scores were significant (p-value<0.001); however, based on SDS questionnaire, the decrease in stigma was not significant (p-value=0.074). In the three-month follow-up, stigma score decreased only based on the differences of OMS-HC scores which were significant between two groups (p-value=0.020). Conclusion: Attending psychiatry clinical rotation could improve the students’ attitudes towards patients with psychiatric disorders and based on OMS-HC questionnaire if combined with intervention package, could improve this attitude even further.