Introduction:

Vasovagal syncope has an incidence between 10% and 19% in the general population, whose first episodes appear in youth.

Objective:

To estimate the prevalence of vasovagal syncope in a university student population from the southern Colombia, using a diagnostic questionnaire adapted from the Calgary Scale.

Materials and methods:

After voluntary signing of the informed consent form, students were surveyed through the Calgary Scale, and a subsequent follow-up questionnaire was conducted on positive participants.

Results:

280 students participated in the study and 17% of them obtained a positive score for vasovagal syncope, being positive female participants the largest group. The mean age of participants was 21.45±5.18 years. At the follow-up, 10% of the positive cases had sought out treatment in emergency rooms because of consciousness loss, 4% were hospitalized, and 10% had secondary injuries.

Conclusions:

Even though an important number of patients was positive on the Calgary Scale, none of them had been diagnosed with neutrally mediated syncope, despite being treated in emergency rooms and/or presenting secondary lesions due to consciousness loss. The use of the Calgary Scale during the assessment of patients being treated for consciousness loss could help to early diagnose vasovagal syncope.

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