0185 Video Game Addiction and Its Relationship with Sleep Quality Among Medical Students

Abstract Introduction Problematic video game playing has grown vastly in the past decade with internet addiction and has caused many public health problems. Among these problems is the poor sleep quality as a result of gaming addiction. Given the significant increase in video game sales, it is important to determine the prevalence of gaming addiction among medical students and whether it is associated with poor sleep quality which may be reflected on the academic performance. Methods A cross-sectional survey was conducted between January and June of 2023 on medical students of King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. An online survey was used and was divided into three sections. The first section included demographic data. The second section included the 7-item Gaming Addiction Scale (GAS), and the third section included the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI). Using GAS Scale and based on the total score, gamers are classified as addicted, problematic, engaged, or normal. Hence, abnormal gamers include engaged gamers, problematic gamers, and addicted gamers. Results There were 357 participants with mean age of 22.5 -/+ 1.8 years and 75.3 % were males. The data showed that 38.8% of the study population were abnormal gamers: 40 (11.2%) engaged gamers, 81 (22.8%) problematic gamers and 17 (4.8%) addicted gamers. Furthermore, abnormal gaming was linked to poor sleep quality when comparing abnormal gamers with normal gamers (92% VS 80.3%, p value of 0.002). Abnormal gamers were found to rely on sleep medication to help them sleep at night and take longer time to fall asleep (p=0.050 & p=0.045 respectively). Conclusion Abnormal gaming is common among medical students and it is strongly associated with poor sleep quality. Support (if any)