75% of med students are on antidepressants, stimulants, or both? (2017)
I'm going to reply to several thoughts I've seen in this thread.1) As u/DevX101 said, "The article is based on a collection of anecdotes from responses to a Facebook question: '75% of med students and residents are taking either stimulants or antidepressants or both. True or false?'"It looks like the 75% number is invented and not actually reflective of survey results.2) Med students would be exactly the type of people that would know that caffeine is technically a stimulant. There are also a decent number of students with valid prescriptions for ADHD, which they would be on regardless of medical school.3) Medical school has always been hard. But the amount information one has to intake and regurgitate seems to have steadily increased. Meanwhile, medical school remains four years long. Technology has evolved to help students absorb more faster. Spaced repetition. Watching lectures at 2x speed. Massive Q-banks. But you have wonder whether this is sustainable.Five years of medical school is a bit untenable because of the debt. Additionally, our education system is not set up to move the preclinical years to undergrad (which I believe other countries do).EDIT4) I suspect depression is seriously underdiagnosed in med students and MORE students should be taking antidepressants than those currently on them.