Prevalence of depression, anxiety, stress and its relationship with knowledge about COVID-19 in medical and laboratory medicine students of Umm-Al-Qura University: a cross-sectional survey

Table 1 Socio-demographic characteristics of the study participants (N = 369)

Variables	Frequency	Percentages
Sex
Male	46	12.5
Female	323	87.5
Age-groups
18–25	337	91.3
26–30	32	8.7
Level of education
Undergraduate	346	91.8
Postgraduate	23	8.2
Marital status
Unmarried	337	91.3
Married	24	6.5
Widowed/divorced/separated	08	2.2
History of psychiatric illness
Present	69	14.6
Absent	315	85.4
Family history of psychiatric illness
Present	69	18.7
Absent	300	81.3
History of any chronic physical illness
Present	91	24.7
Absent	278	75.3
History of contracting COVID-19
Yes	59	16.0
No	310	84.0
History of family member contracting COVID-19
Yes	148	40.1
No	221	59.9
History of quarantine due to contact with positive patient
Yes	114	30.9
No	255	69.1
History of close contact with COVID-19 patient in recent past
Yes	124	33.6
No	245	66.4
History of hospitalization due to COVID 19 (yourself or any of family member)
Yes	58	15.7
No	311	84.3
History of ICU admission (you or your family member)
Yes	90	24.4
No	279	75.6

With respect to the knowledge on various aspects of COVID-19, majority of the participants knew correctly that COVID-19 can be prevented by use of face mask, social distancing, and hand washing (94.6%) and COVID-19 is mainly transmitted through respiratory droplets such as coughing and sneezing (94.0), whereas only 39.6% of the participants knew that 56° for 30 min, diethyl ether, 75% ethanol, peracetic acid and other lipid solvents can effectively kill the virus causing COVID