Perceived stigma among undergraduate medical students towards people with psychiatric illness: A cross sectional study.

Background: Over 450 million individuals worldwide suffer from mental illnesses, according to epidemiological data, making this one of the biggest problems facing modern medicine. People often react in a fairly discriminatory way to those with mental illness, and stigmatizing views toward those with mental illness are ubiquitous. In India, people who suffer from mental illness live with their families, and the stigma associated with mental illness has a significant impact on how effectively these people are treated over time by their families and communities.