Incidence of academic failure and its underlying factors in Lorestan university of medical sciences

Academic failure, conceived of as lack of success in one’s education, is of paramount importance for students of medical sciences and it might lead to more acute problems. The present study set out to investigate the prevalence and underlying reasons of academic failure in Lorestan University of medical sciences. In this cohort study, academic records of all students of Lorestan University of Medical Sciences during the academic years of 2006-2011 were collected from education and student affair center and also, demographic and educational records were entered into a checklist. Inappropriate grade point average, being a provisional student, prolonged graduation, expulsion and dropout were taken into account as academic failure. To model the related effective factors, logistic regression was adopted and significance level was set at 0.05. The cumulative incidence of academic failure was about 25.1%. Factors such as department, being self-funded or government-funded student, academic grade students are pursuing, the elapsed time between academic grades, gender and location of residence were related to academic failure (P<0.05). It is worth mentioning that no relationship was observed between the academic failure and being accepted based on quota system. The most important at risk groups were students of department of medicine and health, associate or medical doctoral students, self-funded students, students with a considerable time elapsed between their academic grades, male students and students living in dormitory. It is suggested that these students refer to consulting centers of university or educational supervisors and receive particular attention.