Computer use in medical students

Objective: to check the knowledge,attitude,and practice of computer use in medical students. the second objective was to determine if there is any gender difference in self reported difficulty with using computers. place and duration of study: a private medical college in lahore,pakistan. january - february 2010 methods: cross-sectional survey conducted at on 82 first year mbbs students using a structured questionnaire. subjective assessment of students' computer skills was measured on a five point likert scale. data was entered using spss 16 program and chi-square test was used for statistical association with a p value set at<0.05 to check for gender difference for perceived difficulty in using computers. results: among the respondents 37(45.1%) were males. 60(73.2%) of respondents were regular users of computers,64(78%) had their personal computer,70(85.4%) had internet access at home. most of the respondents used the computer for entertainment 35(42.7%). barriers to computers use included time constraints 48(58.5%) and lack of computer skills in 11(13.5%) of students. there was no statistical gender difference noted in the perceived difficulty for using computers. a majority of respondents 62(75.6%) requested that computer training should be a part of medical curriculum. conclusion: majority of our respondents were regular users of computers mostly for entertainment purposes. barriers to using computers were time constraints and poor computer skills.