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When a young Nigerian is anxious they are typically bothered about the future of their education.

When a young Nigerian is anxious they typically express worries about their work and love life trying to find a balance.

A young Nigerian trying to keep up with schooling and work is at risk of anxiety.

In our last post, we discussed the method through which an anxiety study was done in North West Nigeria (Kebbi) for those participating in the National Youth Corp program. The study was done on those who visited the hospital during a specific period. Although many were asked to participate in the study (over 300) only a few (over 150) agreed and finished the study. The study was done with questionnaires and data was collated after the 3 weeks of the study.

In this post, we will talk about the results of the study and the results of previous studies done on anxiety.

In case you are wondering what these mental health posts are all about here on STEMsocial, well We are Medic Vibes and here on Medic Vibes, we talk about mental health topics. My name is Dr Ebingo Kigigha and I am a medical doctor and an illustrator. I am the main writer here on Medic Vibes and my goal for writing here is to be very knowledgeable on the topics surrounding mental health

Anxiety disorders are a group of mental health disorders including social anxiety, phobia disorders and others that cause symptoms of jitteriness, abnormal sweating, confusion and an increase in heart rate.

Anxiety is a global health issue and a cause of disability for those who suffer from the condition. Though not as high as depression in terms of disability (4th leading cause) Anxiety is the 9th leading in terms of its contribution to years lived with disability.

The symptoms of Anxiety can be classified into physical, psychological and reactionary symptoms.

Some physical symptoms of anxiety are jitteriness, nausea, difficulty breathing abnormal sweating. Psychologically the patient may have abnormal flashbacks, and hearing statements that were said in the past and the patient may also start having nightmares more often than normal. The reactionary symptoms are exaggerated responses to every little stimulus.

Anxiety can become complicated with depression and could progress to suicidal symptoms.

It is important to be very vigilant of these changes in mental orientation. Check out my posts from last month to read more about depression.

The Results

Business illustrations by Storyset

After the study was done, for 3 weeks the 157 participants were diagnosed using a questionnaire typically used for the general population and primary health care centres. Only 122 members finished the study following every detail of the study.

In the test, patients were monitored using their hospital folder numbers. A score of 0-3 was used where 0 means no anxiety and 1-3 indicated some form of anxiety. The criteria had 21 points and 0-7 points indicated a score of 0 and 7 to 10 indicated mild anxiety, 11 to 14 was moderate anxiety and 15 to 14 indicated severe anxiety.

The results showed that there was a 50% anxiety prevalence in the study group. The group was made up mostly of single male university graduates who were Christian from the south. Only a few of them had suffered from a chronic illness in the past. This is important to note because the state where this study was done is mostly Islamic. Females also are known to suffer from anxiety more than men and those with chronic illness would also be more likely to suffer from anxiety.

In a study done in a medical school, the prevalence was found to be over 30% among female medical students.

In the next post, we will be going into the mind of the author of this article in the discussions of the research.

Tips

In addition to exercise being very important for mental health conditions, another universal tip is to generally avoid alcohol use, especially when battling this disorder. Alcohol can distort a patient's mental state short-term and long-term if addiction sets in.

Hive stories

In today's Hive stories I want to highlight a comment from yesterday's post by @thecuriousfool who describes a time when fear and destructive thoughts would slow his decision making make life difficult. I'm glad it was a phase in his life and now he can look at it in the past.

Questions

• What did you learn from the study?
• What do you think could have been done better?
• What did you learn about anxiety from this post?

Conclusion

Anxiety is a very limiting condition and can cause serious liability. I hope these posts will reach out to someone and make a difference.

References

• The prevalence of anxiety symptoms and associated factors among
  Nigerians newly posted for National Youth Service Corps programme
  in North-Western Nigeria.

• Mayo Clinic

• Business illustrations by Storyset