Caries Prevention in Adults- Knowledge, Attitude and Practices among Indian Dental Professionals

Background: Dentists must have accurate knowledge and affirmative attitudes about dental care in order to prevent dental caries. Therefore, the present was conducted with aim to find out knowledge, attitude and actual practices (KAP) for caries prevention in adults on Indian dentist

Material and Methods: This cross-sectional questionnaire study was conducted on private dental practitioners of Ghaziabad city. Knowledge on preventive dentistry was assessed by 16 questions with true/false or multiple choice pattern. A total of 8 questions each were utilized for attitude and practices, respectively on a 5-point likert scale. Student’s t-test and One way ANOVA followed by post hoc test was applied to determine the relationship between mean scores of KAP and demographic variables. The significance level was set at below 0.05.

Results: Slightly better scores for KAP was found in participants belonging to <30 years of age. The total mean KAP scores of dentists were 8.9 ± 2.2, 26.1 ± 1.7, 21.1 ± 1.9, respectively. Approximately 37% dentist agreed or strongly agreed that fluoride application can prevent dental caries in adults. And 31.5% dentist never advised/performed fluoride application in high caries patients.

Conclusion: Strategies to update dentists’ knowledge and practices of primary preventive measures for dental caries may be beneficial in promoting oral health. Findings help in emphasizing the inception and initiation of preventive oral health policies and services in the Indian scenario.