Medical skills training for undergraduate dental students

Abstract

Context: Medical emergencies can happen at any time; dentists and dental students as the members of the health-care system are expected to play an effective role in these situations. All dental schools in Iran provide dental students with the dental emergency management course, but the course is theoretical, and students do not find the opportunity to practice different maneuvers, especially airway management maneuvers, injection, and cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Aims: In this study, we investigated the necessity of learning medical skills, including injection, establishing intravenous line access, practical CPR, and first aid, on undergraduate dental students using a questionnaire. Settings and Design: In this cross-sectional study, 84 dental students were enrolled to fill out a questionnaire about the necessity of learning certain clinical skills; they subsequently participated in a 1-day-long practical medical skills training workshop. Materials and Methods: We enrolled 84 dental students in our study to fill out a questionnaire, and then we held a 1-day-long practical medical skills training workshop for 2 days to study if workshops are effective to achieve the desired educational goals or not. Statistical Analysis Used: SPSS software version 20 (Chicago, IL, USA) was used to analyze the data. Descriptive measures were used for the assessment of the categorical data. Results: Almost all students agreed on the necessity of learning mentioned skills, including blood pressure measurement, injection, CPR, and first aid. Most of them believed that medical skills training for students would enhance their knowledge. Conclusions: Our results showed that most of the students believed that learning mentioned skills in the dentistry educational curriculum is necessary and should be included in the educational program. We suggest that dental students be introduced to these educations throughout their professional curriculum. Our pilot evaluation suggests that workshops would be effective to achieve the desired goals.