The COVID-19 pandemic in the eyes of Polish and Slovak medical students.

BACKGROUND

The main aim of the study was to assess the perception of the COVID-19 pandemic by Polish and Slovak medical students. Additional aims were assessment of their satisfaction with the quality of health care services and their attitudes toward vaccination against SARS-CoV-2. A group of 635 (100%) students of nursing and medicine from Poland and Slovakia were surveyed.

METHODS

The results are part of a study conducted as part of international cooperation between the Silesian Medical University in Katowice (Poland) and the Comenius University in Bratislava, Jessenius Faculty of Medicine in Martin (Slovakia). Data were collected using a proprietary questionnaire developed for the purposes of this study.

CONCLUSION

The findings provide exploratory insight into retrospective perceptions related to psychosocial experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic among surveyed medical students from Poland and Slovakia. The lower evaluation of healthcare services during the pandemic and differences observed between Poland and Slovakia may reflect the perceived strain on healthcare systems, although these results should be interpreted with caution. While students expressed confidence in vaccination, differences between declared attitudes and vaccination uptake were observed, which may highlight the possible role of targeted educational and communication strategies. Overall, the findings may suggest the importance of considering psychosocial and systemic factors in shaping health-related attitudes among medical students. However, due to study limitations, the results should be interpreted cautiously and are not fully generalizable and should primarily be understood within the context of the analyzed sample.