knowledge, Attitude, and Preventive Oral and Dental Self-Care Behaviors among Dentistry and Medical Students of Qom University of Medical Sciences, (Iran

Abstract

Background and Objectives:Oral health is a key component of general health and quality of life. The purpose of this study was to determine knowledge, attitude, and performance of medical and dentistry students of Qom University of Medical Sciences in the field of oral and dental health. Methods:In this descriptive cross-sectional study, a questionnaire was completed by 152 dentistry and medical students of Qom University of Medical Sciences. Using the questionnaire, information on age, gender, knowledge, attitude, and performance of medical and dentistry students of Qom University of Medical Sciences in oral and dental health, were collected. Data were analyzed using Chi-square and logistic regression. The significance level was considered to be less than 0.05. Results:In this study, the mean age of the students was 20.98±2.03, and 50% of them were male. Overall, 45.4% of the students, had high knowledge and 51.3% had positive attitude towards preventive oral and dental care. In multivariate logistic regression model, there was a significant relationship between being male and lower level of knowledge, and there was a significant relationship between being female and studying Dentistry with positive attitude. The Possibility of regular use of dental floss was more reported among female students and students with high knowledge. Also, high knowledge had significant association with dental check-up in recent past year. Conclusion:The results of this study indicated that the status of knowledge, attitudes, and self-care performance of students about preventive oral and dental care, is at average level, and therefore, designing coherent programs for improving these variables, is necessary to promote personal and professional performance in preventive oral and dental care.

Assessment of knowledge, attitude and practice of medical and dental students about maintaining and disinfecting toothbrushes

“…The higher scores of females may imply that women are more concerned about their health and appearance than men 28 . This argument supports our findings, as well as the results of studies by Safari et al, 21 Sharda et al, 17 Halboub et al, 19 Kawas et al, 25 Gupta et al, 28 Vangipuram et al, 32 and Bashiru et al, 33 while it contradicts the result of study on Iranian dental students 23 . Moreover, in studies by Muthu et al 27 and Dagli et al, 30 the oral health attitude and practice of male and female students did not show any significant differences.…”

“…The results of studies by Kumar et al 18 and Bashiru et al 33 similarly showed that most students brushed their teeth at least twice a day. In another study by Safari et al, more than half of the students brushed their teeth once or twice a day (or more) 21 . In the present study, the rate of tooth brushing at least twice a day exceeded 50% among medical and dental students, which is somewhat consistent with the results of studies by Safari et al, Folayan et al, and Khami et al 21–23 …”

“…Based on the present findings, there was a significant relationship between sex and the frequency of tooth brushing. Females tended to practice this preventive oral health behaviour more than males, which is completely consistent with the findings reported by Khami et al 23 Nevertheless, studies by Safari et al 21 and Folayan et al 22 did not indicate a significant relationship.…”

“…In the present study, on average, dental students scored higher in all three domains of the questionnaire compared to medical students. In this regard, Safari et al showed that less than half of medical and dental students had adequate knowledge about preventive oral care, and almost half of them had positive attitudes 21 . Moreover, the results of a study by Folayan et al on dental students in Nigeria revealed that nearly half of the students had a good level of knowledge and a positive attitude 22 In another study on the dental students of seven dental schools in Iran, Khami et al showed that more than half of the students had adequate knowledge and a positive attitude toward preventive oral care 23 .…”

“…The total score of questions related to oral health knowledge was in the range of 8–40, which was categorized into poor, 8–18 fair, 18–29 and good (29–40), based on two cut‐off points. Also, scores of attitude‐related questions were in the range of 9–30, which were classified as follows: negative attitude, 9–16 neutral attitude, 16–23 and positive attitude 23–30 . Besides, scores of practice‐related questions ranged from 22 to 71, which were interpreted as poor (22–38), satisfactory (38–54), and good (54–71).…”