Effectiveness of Scenario-Based Dental Hygiene Education Using Virtual Reality: Intraoral Radiography Training.

Abstract

Purpose/objectives: This study aimed to develop a virtual reality simulation (VRS) program that is based on a scenario, training dental hygiene students in the intraoral bisecting angle technique. We tested the effectiveness of VRS in education using performance confidence (PC), clinical competency (CC) and learning satisfaction (LS).

Methods: This study developed a program based on performance competency and conducted a single-group pretest-posttest experiment to test its effectiveness. Thirty-three second- and third-year dental hygiene students were recruited from a single dental hygiene university. We confirmed each item's validity based on the content validity index (CVI) and compared differences in PC, LS and CC before and after training.

Results: Significant differences were observed in PC, which increased from a score of 78.51 ± 9.0 before training to 89.33 ± 7.03 after the first training and to 94.00 ± 5.75 after the second training (p < 0.001). CC increased significantly from 69.92 ± 9.46 before training to 87.04 ± 4.43 after training. LS also increased significantly, from a score of 94.15 ± 8.15 before training to 97.45 ± 4.71 after training (p = 0.002).

Conclusions: Dental hygiene students' PC, CC and LS improved after training using a VRS for the intraoral bisecting angle technique. VRS training is an effective educational tool that can complement traditional skills training; such training programmes should be developed not only for dental hygiene courses but also for the education and skill enhancement of other dental professionals.