Study of the knowledge and attitude about principles and practices of orthodontic treatment among general dental practitioners and non orthodontic specialist

Abstract

Background: general dental practitioners and non-orthodontic specialty play an important role in educating their patients about the principles and practice of orthodontic treatment; which may be very beneficial to the patient’s lifestyle. It is, therefore, important to spot their level of data and attitude toward treatment . This study was planned to review this aspect within the sort of comparative analysis generally dental practitioners and other specialties in dentistry. Hence the aim of this study is to analyse the knowledge and attitude about principles and practices of orthodontic treatment among general dental practitioners and non orthodontic specialists. Materials and methods: The sample size used for the study is 105. A self structured questionnaire is being prepared and uploaded in Google forms. A questionnaire in Google forms is being circulated among the sample study population and at the end of the survey, all the data were collected and the data is been analysed by using the software IBM SPSS. Descriptive statistics were expressed by means of number, frequency, and percentage. Chi-square test was used to find the association between variables. Result: The present study reported that 43% of dental practitioners and 30% of non orthodontic specialists felt that orthodontic treatments can be started at any age. 43% of dental practitioners and 31% of non orthodontic specialists were aware that teeth had to be removed for aligning irregular teeth.Chi square test was done and association was found to be statistically not significant(Chi square value is 0.68 ; p> 0.05) Conclusion: Among the study population dental practitioners showed greater knowledge and awareness in comparison to non orthodontic specialist.This particular comparative study added more focus on the facts of existing conditions and scenarios of the knowledge and attitude of the general dental practitioners and other practicing specialities of dentistry towards the principles and practices of orthodontic treatment. Therefore the study showed the need for increased clinically oriented education of practice and ideas of orthodontic treatment.