First year medical students' perceptions of stress and support: a comparison between reformed and traditional track curricula.

Background: The authors hypothesised that medical schools need to support their students by identifying the challenges inherent in the demanding study of medicine, especially during the transitional phase at the beginning of study. Therefore, a study was conducted to evaluate Year 1 students' perceptions on how well 2 different programmes--a reformed and a traditional programme--helped students make a good start to their studies.

Design: Cross-sectional survey.