Depressive symptoms and depressed mood among Chinese medical students in Hong Kong

Abstract

The depressive symptoms and symptom dimensions of 335 undergraduate Chinese medical students were assessed and described using the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Although there were subtle sex differences in the endorsement of specific symptoms, male and female medical students did not differ in the degree of depressed mood as reflected in the BDI scores. Using the cutoff scores of 9/10 and 29/30, respectively, close to half of the Chinese medical students would be in the depressed range, and 2% would be in the severely depressed range. While Chinese medical students appeared to have higher mean BDI score than US medical students, their mean score was not higher than that derived from a separate sample of 213 Chinese nonmedical undergraduates.