Awareness of Specialties of Dentistry among Medical Trainees and Teaching Faculties of Medical Colleges in the Eastern India

ABSTRACT

Background:

The lack of general medical practitioners’ knowledge of oral disease contributes to delays in referral and treatment.

Aim:

To assess the awareness of dental problems/conditions and its related dental specialty that treat them, among the medical trainees and teaching faculty of a medical college.

Results:

The majority (88.5%) of the subjects were aware of dentistry.

Conclusion:

An adequate level of understanding and cooperation is therefore needed between medical and dental health teams to ensure qualitative health care delivery.

INTRODUCTION

William Osler has rightly said, “Mouth is the mirror of general health.”[1] Poor dental and oral health may adversely affect overall general health.[2] Dental problems usually in most situations do not lead to significant risk or threat to life, because of which they are overlooked and considered as less important by many of the medical doctors. By virtue of their professional role, medical personnel play a vital role in health promotion and preventive information dissemination in community levels. It is important that their own oral knowledge is good and their oral health behavior conforms to the expectation of the population.[3] Little is known regarding the scope of dentistry among the medical postgraduates; good awareness toward dental surgery among different branches of medical professionals is essential for better referral and, in turn, for the benefit of the patient.[4] Henceforth, there was a need to assess the knowledge and awareness of dental specialty among Medical Trainees and Teaching Faculty in a medical College.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

A cross-sectional questionnaire study had been conducted to assess the awareness of dental specialties among medical trainees and teaching faculties of ANMMCH, Gaya, Bihar. All the medical students (MBBS and PGs) aged 18 years and above, either gender, studying and teaching faculties in ANMMCH, Gaya, were included in the study, whereas the subjects who were critically ill, noncooperative, or not willing to provide consent had been excluded. A patient information sheet was given, and written informed consent had been taken from the subjects. Thereafter, the information had been taken as per various tools and instruments, as described below.

Tools for assessment

Sociodemographic variables: Age, gender, education years, marital status, current living arrangement, and place of residence. The questionnaire included a set of self-administered, fixed, closed-ended questions adapted from pretested questionnaires according to Oyetola et al.[5] The questionnaire had been designed to have four sections: Section A collected information on biodata such as age, sex, marital status, and category of the participant. Section B collected information on dental awareness and knowledge of dentistry. Section C collected participants’ knowledge of the relationship between oral health and systemic health, and Section D evaluated the referral practices of the participants.

RESULTS AND ANALYSIS

Printed and validated questionnaires had been given personally to a total of 250 medical students and faculties of different specialties of the medical college. Participants were approached personally in their respective departments, and the responses were collected. The results were tabulated using Microsoft Excel 2010. Among 250 individuals, 240 participants completed the questionnaire, yielding a response rate of 96%. Female participants (47%) predominated. The mean age and standard deviation were 26.2 years and 3.2, respectively, with the majority (84.3%) belonging to the 21–30-year age group category, and 87% had single marital status. More than half (67.5%) of the participants were medical students. The majority (88.5%) of the respondents were aware of dentistry. Less than half (43%) had been to a dentist for treatment or checkup; most of whom were medical doctors. Busy work schedules in 34% subjects and absence of dental complaints in 54% subjects were some of the reasons why they would not want to seek dental consultation.

The majority (67.4%) of the subjects agreed that oral and maxillofacial surgery is a dental specialty that treats facial fractures. 38.5% were aware that orthodontics treats abnormally arranged teeth. About 22.5% of the subjects did not know the specialty of dentistry that treats a hole on the tooth, and only 24% were able to attribute a hole in the tooth to restorative dentistry. Only 14% of the participants associated the management of unusual facial pain to Oral Medicine, while the majority of the respondents did not know which of the specialties of dentistry could best manage unusual facial pain. Similarly, 54.3% of the subjects named complex sugar as an etiological factor for dental caries, while 12.8% did not know the cause of dental caries. Only 12% subjects knew Ludwig angina to be a fascial space infection, the majority of whom were medical doctors. Others either believed it to be a cardiac disease (29.8%) or did not know what it was (25.4%). Regarding knowledge about periodontal disease exacerbating systemic health, 72.5% of the subjects believed periodontitis could exacerbate infective endocarditis. The majority of the respondents believed that oral health could affect the nutrition of patients. Only 35% of the respondents strongly agreed that delayed dental treatment could lead to life-threatening conditions. A large number (48.6%) also believed that the management of orofacial cancer was best done by oral and maxillofacial surgeons. 62.5% of the subjects had never referred patients for dental consultation. However, the majority of them believed that patients with toothache, offensive mouth odor, and dental abscess should be referred to dentists for treatment.

DISCUSSION

Dental problems usually in most situations do not lead to significant risk or threat to life. Because of this, they are overlooked and considered as less important by many of the medical doctors.[3] Hence, the present study assessed the knowledge and awareness of dental specialty among medical trainees and teaching faculty in a medical college. Our study showed that the majority (88.5%) of the respondents were aware of dentistry. These findings are similar to the reports of Azodo et al.,[6] wherein lack of awareness of various specialties of dentistry was observed among the medical doctors. The increased awareness in this study may be due to the fact that the study was done among the educated/professionals. However, results differ in studies done among medical students. Sujatha et al.[7] showed that only 25% of the medical students has good oral health awareness. This is not unexpected since the students are in traning. Despite the increased oral health campaign in the community at large, it appears that there has not been much of a positive change in attitude and knowledge of people to Dentistry. This is largely due to the little or no exposure to dental education during the course of their traning. Therefore, inclusion of dental education into the medical curriculum will go a long way in improving dental knowledge and skills among medical practitioners as suggested by Usman S et al.[8] and Asif N et al.[9] Hence, basic knowledge of dentistry by medical health workers is required in improving health care, especially in the developing world with limited human resources. Thereby, inclusion of dental education at both undergraduate and postgraduate medical curriculums appears to be a promising solution to this unnecessary knowledge gap between the medical and dental professions.

CONCLUSION

This study has shown that the majority of health workers within the hospital are aware of the dental profession, but their knowledge and attitude to dentistry are still poor. Hence, there was a low scale of awareness of specialties of dentistry among medical trainees and teaching faculties of medical colleges in eastern India and this study aided to give some deep insight into it and various reasons behind it.

Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts of interest.

Funding Statement

Nil.