Warning: residency can make you depressed

N_s_Mom
Thu, 10 Dec 2015 23:05:36 +0000

One variable that I didn’t see addressed was whether the incidence of depression was higher among foreign medical school grads than among US grads. Since 25% of residents are foreign medical school grads, they are dealing with culture shock, distance from home (many lived at or near home through college and medical school and had a ready support system at hand), many are located in ‘less desirable’ locations/specialties - and the stress that if it goes poorly, they will not have other options in the US. I would therefore expect to see much higher rates of depression in foreign medical grads than in the US grad population.

Just speculation here since I have no data - but the report didn’t address this and I think it’s a weakness.