Mindfulness, healthcare, education, stress, students
Health and social care undergraduate students experience significant stress due to high workloads and pressure to perform, often impacting upon the quality of patient care delivered in subsequent careers. Wellness is becoming increasingly viewed as an essential professional competency, and mindfulness may be a suitable way to incorporate wellness training into health and social care degree courses.
Objective: The objective of this systematic review is to identify and critically appraise the literature on the effects of Mindfulness-Based Interventions for health and social care undergraduate students.
Evidence: A search of PubMed, EMBASE, Psych Info, CINAHL, The Cochrane Library and Academic Search Complete was conducted from inception to 31st March 2016. A manual search of key journals and reference lists was also conducted. Studies that delivered Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy, or an intervention modelled closely on one of these, to health or social care undergraduate students were included in the review. The search strategy yielded eleven papers, and a narrative synthesis was conducted. The risk of bias was assessed using the Cochrane Risk of Bias Tool.
Findings: Eleven studies, representing students from medicine, nursing and psychology met the inclusion criteria. The overall risk of bias was unclear, due to lack of reported evidence. The most commonly used measurement tools were the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire, the General Health Questionnaire and the measure of Subjective Wellbeing. Primary outcomes were benefits relating to stress, mood, anxiety, and mindfulness levels. Gender and personality emerged as factors likely to affect intervention results.
Conclusions/Relevance: Mindfulness-Based Interventions may produce benefits for health and social care undergraduate students in areas including stress, mood, and anxiety. The strength of available evidence is ambiguous. Further research is required to definitively conclude that mindfulness is an appropriate intervention to mentally prepare health and social care undergraduate students for their future careers.