Social supports, perceived stress, and health: the black experience in medical school--a preliminary study

Abstract

Black medical students perceived significantly more stressors than white medical students in a predominantly white medical school environment (P=0.001). Black medical students perceived fewer social supports than white medical students, but not significantly fewer (P=0.224). There was no significant difference between mean systolic and diastolic blood pressure levels for the low and high stress groups (P=0.302 and 0.844, respectively). The total degree of perceived stressors did not predict systolic and diastolic blood pressure when controlling for potential confounders (0.05<P<0.1). The interaction of total degree stressors and total degree of social supports did not significantly predict systolic and diastolic blood pressures when controlling for potential confounding variables (P>0.25 and 0.1<P<0.25, respectively).