Cornell Medical Index: a comparative study on health problems among Thai and Japanese nursing students

Cross cultural differences in subjective physical and psychological health problems reported on the Cornell Medical Index (CMI) Thai and Japanese versions were conducted among Thai and Japanese female first year class nursing students from two nursing colleges. All of the Thai (114) and 96.2% (102) of the Japanese subjects self-administered the CMI. The internal consistency reliability of each CMI was acceptable. Mean ages of the Thai and the Japanese subjects were 19.3 (SD = 0.8) and 18.4 (SD = 0.5) years respectively, which was not significantly different. Mean CMI for the physical, psychological and overall health complaints of the Thai subjects were 29.8 (SD = 13.5), 14.5 (SD = 8.0), and 41.3 (SD = 19.3) respectively, and those for the Japanese subjects were 15.7 (SD = 11.8), 7.3 (SD = 6.1), and 23.1 (SD = 15.9) respectively, which were significantly different. Findings indicate that the Thai nursing students have more health problems than the Japanese subjects. These mostly concerned respiratory, cardiovascular, digestive, musculoskeletal, nervous, genitourinary systems, fatigability, frequency of illnesses, miscellaneous diseases, mood and feeling patterns, sensitivity, anger and tension. The only one section that the Japanese reported significantly higher health problems than the Thai subjects concerned daily living habits pertaining to questions concerning such matters as drinking, smoking, exercise, sleeping and rest. Percentages of emotional disturbances or neurotic tendencies of the subjects using the conventional CMI score and the Fukamachi criteria are discussed.