Level of knowledge and attitude of spanish primary school teachers regarding tooth avulsion.

Abstract

Background: Nowadays, traumatic dental injuries (TDIs) have a growing prevalence and incidence worldwide, reaching their highest numbers in school-age children. The management of dental avulsion requires an important challenge for the clinicians and the prognosis depends on an immediate and an appropriate emergency action. In this regard, primary school teachers are in a privileged position to assist injured children. Objective: To assess the knowledge and attitudes of primary school teachers regarding the proper management of dental avulsion in schoolchildren.

Material and methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in Spain, including teachers from schools distributed throughout the Spanish territory, selected randomly. The sample consisted of 240 teachers. An ad hoc questionnaire, distributed in physical and online formats, was used to assess their knowledge on the proper management of dental avulsion in schoolchildren.

Results: A very high response rate was obtained (80%). The majority of the participants were unable to reimplant the tooth (76.3%), and they lacked knowledge of the appropriate medium for its optimal preservation (85.8%).

Conclusions: This study suggests that there is an inadequate level of knowledge about the management of dental avulsion injuries among primary school teachers in Spain. It would be necessary to design educational strategies to improve this situation. Key words:Primary school teachers, traumatology, avulsion, knowledge.