Knowledge and Practice of General Dentists and Senior Dental Students of Isfahan in Dental drug Prescription

Abstract

Introduction: Proper diagnosis and administration of medication is one of the main aspect of treatment done by healthcare workers, such as dentists. Therefore, they should have enough knowledge, act precisely regarding the drug selection, dosage, and duration of treatment. The current study aimed to assess the knowledge and practice of the senior dentistry students and general dentists in Isfahan. Materials & Methods: The present descriptive, analytical, and cross-sectional study was done on 99 senior dentistry students and 89 general dentists in 2018 in Isfahan. The questionnaire of this study contained 3 parts, including demographic details and information on knowledge and practice. The obtained data were analyzed with T-test, One-way ANOVA, and Spearman correlation (p value < 0.05). Results: The knowledge of the dentists and students at the poor level comprised (2.2% and 3% respectively), in moderate (82% and 82.9%) and in good (15.8% and 14.1%), respectively and for practice, for low (7.9% and 5%), moderate (84.2% and 89.6%) and good (7.9% and 8.1%), respectively. The practice of both dentist (p value < 0.001,r = 0.417) and students (p value = 0.03, r = 0.213) was remarkably associated with their knowledge. The comparison of the knowledge (p value = 0.30) and practice (p value = 0.33) between dentists and students showed no statistical difference. Conclusion: According to the result of this study, it seems that conducting further training programs and making educational pamphlets on drug prescription can help increase the knowledge and practice of dentist dentistry student.