Knowledge and Attitude about Dental Trauma among House Officers of Dental Surgery

Abstract

Background: Dental trauma is trauma of teeth, periodontium and surrounding tissues. It occurs frequently in children and young adults. Traumatic injuries are one of the commonest injuries, it occurs at schools, homes, accidents or sports. The most common site of dental trauma is maxillary central incisors. Aim: To assess the knowledge and attitude about dental trauma among house officers of dental surgery. Methods: This cross-sectional survey was performed on house officers from four dental teaching hospitals of Islamabad, affiliated with Islamabad Medical and Dental College, Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences, Rawal Institute of Health Sciences and Riphah University from September 2020 to February 2021. A self-administered questionnaire was used to assess the knowledge and attitude of house officers about dental trauma. Those who were not willing to participate and incompletely filled questionnaires were excluded. IBM-SPSS version 22 was used for data entry and descriptive analysis. Results: Out of the 200 distributed questionnaires, 156 completed questionnaires were received so the response rate was 78%. Among 156 participants, 47 (30.1%) were male and 109 (69.9%) were females. Descriptive analysis of the knowledge showed that almost half of participants had good [n=82, (52.56%)] knowledge regarding dental trauma while house officers showed variable responses regarding their attitude toward dental trauma. Conclusion: The percentage of house officers with good knowledge and attitude about dental trauma was relatively high and the percentage of the ones with poor knowledge was more or less the same. Keywords: Attitude; Dentistry; House Officer; Knowledge; Surgery; Trauma.