Investigation of Stress Level Among Dentistry Students, General Dentists, and Pediatric Dental Specialists During Performing Pediatric Dentistry in Kerman, Iran, in 2017

Background & Aim: Dentists are exposed to stress and tension as they have a close contact with the patients. The increase in stress may affect the dentists' performance and can be a major threat to the physical and mental health of the patients. Pediatric dentistry requires experience, without which the amateur dentists and students feel lack of self-confidence, and consequently be unable to deal with problematic patients. There is no study investigating stress during pediatric dentistry among the dentistry students as well as general and pediatric dentists in Iran. Regarding the importance of this subject, we aimed to evaluate the stress level among the aforementioned three dental service providers during pediatric dentistry. Materials & Methods: This study was conducted on 300 dentistry students, general dentists, and pediatric dental specialists in Kerman, Iran. The data were collected using a questionnaire entailing demographic information and therapeutic practices of pediatric dentistry. After checking the participant's comments, the data were analyzed using SPSS version 16 (IBM, Texas, USA). Results: According to the results, the mean age of the participants was 28 +/- 5 years. Out of the 300 participants, 113 (37.7%) and 178 (59.3%) cases were male and female, respectively, and 9 (3%) participants did not fill out this part. Furthermore, 108 (36%), 173 (57.7%), 6 (2%), and 10 (3.3%) subjects were general students, general dentists, residents, and pediatric residents, respectively. Anesthesia injection in the mandible for an anxious child and amalgam restoration in the mandible led to the highest and lowest stress levels in the participants, respectively. Furthermore, the mean stress levels were significantly different between the practices performed in the maxilla and mandible (P<0.001). In addition, the females showed a significantly higher level of stress, compared to the males (P<0.001). The specialists had significantly lower stress than the dentistry students and general dentists (P<0.001). Conclusion: As the findings indicated, anesthetic injection to a nervous infant was the most stressful practice in pediatric dentistry. The results also showed that the pediatric dental specialists had lower stress level, compared to the students and general dentists.