Medical Students' Disease

Medical students' disease, also called second year syndrome or intern's syndrome, is a condition frequently reported among medical students, in which a student comes to believe they are experiencing the symptoms of a disease they are currently studying. The condition is associated with a fear of actually contracting the disease in question. Some researchers argue it should be called nosophobia rather than hypochondriasis, since studies show a very low rate of genuinely hypochondriacal character among affected students and the hypochondriasis label carries therapeutic and prognostic implications the condition does not warrant, leading a student instead to become unduly preoccupied with ordinary physiological or psychological sensations; its severity correlates more with accidental factors of learning and clinical exposure than with any underlying psychopathology.