Knowledge of Dentistry, Medicine, and Pharmacy Students about Psychedelic Drugs in Kerman University of Medical Sciences.
BACKGROUND
Psychedelic drugs can cause one to get out of normal status and permanent cerebral defects, via affecting central nervous system. Consumption of theses drugs seems to be increasing nowadays especially among the youth and university educated population. We conducted a study to evaluate the awareness of medical science students of Kerman University of medical science who are going to be the future medical population.


METHODS
This cross-sectional study was carried out on 471 of students of medicine, dentistry and pharmacy which were in the first to forth year of their education about psychedelic drugs (Ecstasy, LSD, Ice, crack and Yaba). To evaluate the students' awareness of drugs we used questionnaire with reliability and validity proven via pilot study. Statistics analysis was performed using SPSS13 software.


RESULTS
Average of their age was 3.2 ± 20.4. Overall among the students, 56.7% were in the low level of insight, 34.3% in medium and 6.9% in good level and 2.2% had best insight of the drugs. Also only 32.2% of students had the full information about the name of drug, 25.7 % had information about the form of them, 24% about the addiction with them, 7% about their complication and only 5% about the origin of drugs. The information about all psychedelic drugs was higher among pharmacy students, students of the third year and males.


CONCLUSIONS
Our study showed a low insight about psychedelic drugs like Ecstasy, LSD, Ice, Crack, and Yaba among the students. According to this lack of information of these groups, it is suggested that educational courses about the complication, signs and symptoms of these drugs be held.
Researcher, Students' Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Akram
A
Nakhaee
Researcher, Students' Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Amir Reza
AR
Ghassemi
Researcher, Students' Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Zahra
Z
Torshizi
Researcher, Students' Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Nazanin
N
Ebrahimi
Researcher, Students' Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Najmeh
N
Rostami
Researcher, Students' Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Zohreh
Z
Karimzadeh
Researcher, Students' Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Asieh
A
Sanjaripoor
Assistant Professor of Physiology, Neuroscience Research Centre, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Iran.
Vahid
V
Sheibani
Crack; Ecstasy; Ice; Knowledge; LSD; Professional PhD students; Psychedelic drugs; Yaba