OBJECTIVES

To evaluate the impact of the first COVID-19 lockdown in 2020 on the burnout and study satisfaction of medical students.

DESIGN

A cross-sectional study with a presurvey and postsurvey.

SETTING

University of Split School of Medicine (USSM), Split, Croatia. The lockdown in the COVID-19 pandemic lasted from late March to mid-May 2020. There was a full switch to e-learning at the USSM during this period, and all clinical teaching was stopped.

PARTICIPANTS

Students enrolled in the 2019/2020 academic year. Data were collected before lockdown in December 2019 and January 2020 and again after the end of lockdown in June 2020.

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES

Study satisfaction was assessed using the study satisfaction survey. Burnout was assessed using two instruments: Oldenburg Burnout Inventory and Copenhagen Burnout Inventory. We used Bayesian statistics to compare before-and-after differences.

RESULTS

437 independent responses (77.2% response rate) were collected before and 235 after lockdown (41.5% response rate). 160 participant responses were eligible for pairing. There was no significant difference for both paired and unpaired participants in study satisfaction before (3.38 on a 1-5 scale; 95% credible interval (95% CrI) 3.32 to 3.44) and after (3.49, 95% CrI 3.41 to 3.57) lockdown. We found no evidence (Bayes factor (BF) >3.00 as a cut-off value) for an increase in the level of burnout before and after lockdown, both in independent and paired samples.

CONCLUSIONS

It seems that the first pandemic-related lockdown and a switch to e-learning did not affect burnout levels among medical students or their perception of their study programme. More insight is needed on the short-term and long-term effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on medical students and their education. Well-structured longitudinal studies on medical student burnout during the COVID-19 pandemic are needed.