Ahmad P, Chaudhary A, Asif JA, AlSagob EI, Alkahtany MF, Almadi KH, AlMubarak A, Abduljabbar T, Vohra F. Risk analysis of factors in clinical anxiety among undergraduate and postgraduate students in dentistry.
Work 2021;
71:177-186. [PMID:
34924411 DOI:
10.3233/wor-205093]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/15/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND
When anxiety is persistent among dental students, the consequence could be poor academic performance, ill health, lack of empathy, and exhaustion.
OBJECTIVE
This study aimed to determine the level of anxiety along with anxiety-provoking factors among clinical dental students.
METHODS
This study included dental undergraduate and postgraduate clinical students from a public university. A modified version of the self-administered Moss and McManus questionnaire, which consisted of 50 items, was utilized to evaluate the levels of anxiety. The results were analyzed using SPSS ® version 24. The significance level was set at p < 0.05.
RESULTS
Within 180 participants, 140 (77.77%) were undergraduate students, while 40 (22.22%) were postgraduate dental students. Overall, the top clinical anxiety-provoking factor included failure to pass the final examination, whereas the least clinical anxiety-provoking element was communicating with the opposite gender. Significant differences existed among male and female participants in the seven anxiety-provoking factors among the participants namely dealing with elderly patients, fail to pass finals, arresting post-extraction bleeding, patients asking difficult questions, fear of accidental pulp exposure, dealing with a child or non-cooperative patient, and fear of taking an incorrect impression. Postgraduate students showed lower anxiety scores in various clinical tasks as compared to undergraduate students.
CONCLUSIONS
Postgraduate dental students share largely the same perspectives with undergraduate dental students on the clinical anxiety-provoking situations with slight variations. Being the future healthcare providers, dental students must learn techniques to help them manage their dental anxiety and fear as well as deal with anxiety related to treating patients.
Collapse