Assessment of operational conditions of dentists working in state children’s dental polyclinics

Abstract

Introduction. Assessing the operational conditions of doctors is a difficult and urgent task. There are very few studies on the operational conditions of dentists providing care to children.The aim of the study was to conduct a comprehensive hygienic assessment of the operational dentists working in state children’s dental polyclinics.Material and methods. A comprehensive hygienic assessment of the operational conditions of dentists providing care to children was performed at 49 workplaces in 5 state medical institutions in St. Petersburg. We studied the factors of the operational environment (physical, chemical, biological), as well as the factors of the labor process (severity and hardness), and performed the comparison of the operational conditions of pediatric dentists, dental surgeons, and orthodontists. The paired t-test or Mann-Whitney was used for comparison of means. All tests were two-way; the level of statistical significance p <0.05.Results. According to the microclimate parameters, vibration, and lighting, all workplaces corresponded to the second (permissible) class of working conditions. In terms of noise, the working conditions of pediatric dentists and orthodontic corresponded to class 3.3, and the working conditions of dental surgeons - to class 2. The degree of chemical pollution at all workplaces corresponded to class 2, the degree of biological air pollution - to class 3.2. According to the hardness of the labor process, the working conditions of dentists of specialties under investigation corresponded to class 2 at 36 workplaces (73%) and class 3.1 at 13 workplaces (27%). In terms of labor intensity, they corresponded to class 1 at 20 workplaces (41%) and class 2 at 29 workplaces (59%). The overall assessment of operational conditions for pediatric dentists and orthodontists corresponds to class 3.3, and for dental surgeons – to class 3.2.Conclusion. The major harmful factors at the workplace of dentists were noise, biological pollution, and the hardness of the work process. It is necessary to further study the comprehensive and combined effects of various occupational factors of dentists taking care of children to maintain health, working capacity, and high-level quality of life, as well as to develop measures for their improvement.