Prevalence of Problematic Mobile Phone Use Among Undergraduate Medical, Dental, and Nursing Students in Rajnandgaon, Chhattisgarh: A Cross-Sectional Study Using the MUST Scale

Abstract

ntroduction

Increased mobile phone usage among undergraduate medical students causes a detrimental effect on their health.

The study aims to identify mobile phone usage patterns and the factors influencing excessive use.

Materials & Methods

A cross-sectional study was conducted among undergraduate students of Medical & Nursing, Dental from the

Rajnandgaon city, Chhattisgarh from March 2023 to July 2023. Data were collected from 667 students using the

MUST scale, an 18-item mobile phone screening test in a self-report Likert-type format (5 points), to identify

excessive use. Microsoft Excel and IBM SPSS 22 were used to analyse the data.

Results

64% were female & 36% were male, 41.2% users were belonging to 21-22 age groups, with 73% users age of first

use of mobile phone were >16 yrs age, 37% student were prefer using mobile and staying indoors, 45.6% students

were using mobile phone daily 4-6 hrs/day. 66.9 % of students were using mobile phones at bed time. A significant

association was found between Skip food due to phone use in the last 7 days (p < 0.01), daily use of smartphone per

day and phone use at bed time (p<0.0001).

Conclusion

The study shows the alarming rate of risk of smartphone addiction among medical students, Nursing, Dental

students. Students should be encouraged to assess their mobile phone addiction and increase awareness of the

issue. Thus, limiting mobile phone access may be beneficial.