Dentist’s Appearance: Does It Matter?

Abstract

Dentistry is a client dependent field. Other than the dentist’s skills, the dentist’s appearance has been observed to affect the patient’s perception of the clinician. This research was conducted to assess patient’s perception of the dentist’s appearance based on the dentist’s attire, gender and age. A total number of 492 Malay respondents were involved in this study. A set of questionnaires was randomly distributed via google forms. This questionnaire consisted of three sections, including socio-demographic details of the respondents, patient’s perception towards dentist’s attire and patient’s perception towards dentist’s gender and age. The result showed that respondents consisted of 78% female and 22% male. The highest percentage of participants was in the age group of 18-30 (85.6%), while the lowest percentage of respondents came from the age group of 49-60 (5.3%). The majority of respondents (51%) preferred a dentist who wears a white coat followed by a dentist in scrub (38.2%) and a dentist dressed in formal attires (9.3%). Only 1.4% of respondents selected a dentist who wears casual attire. Participants also prefer dentist in the age group of 41-60 years old, while participants had no preference toward dentist’s gender. A final open-ended question showed respondents also preferred to see dentists with acceptable dental appearance, good behaviour and established qualification. In conclusion, a dentist’s appearance is important to secure a promising interpretation of the patient towards the dentist.