Effect of handedness in professional dentists

Context: The availability of appropriate tools and equipment's according to the dominant hand is very important for safe and effective dental education and professional dental practice. Aims: To study the effect of handedness on professional practice in left and right handed dentists from Mumbai and Navi Mumbai. Settings and Design: Cross-sectional study of left handed and right handed dentists (including students pursuing final year in dentistry, interns, post graduate dentists and professional dentists) Subjects and Methods: A self devised questionnaire was drafted with due reference to the review of literature. The pre validated questionnaire was administered to the study subjects via a face-to-face method. Statistical Analysis: Descriptive analysis of the data was done using mean and standard deviations for quantitative data and proportions for qualitative data. Results: 53% of left handed were males rest 47% were females. Currently 53% of the left dominant dental population were using left sided dental chair however 83% would prefer to use left sided chair in their future practice. 93% of the left handed population did not receive suitable tools according to their hand preference. 80% did not receive the guidance based on hand preference during the educational years. 7% of right handed and 20% left handed dentists experienced injuries due to the right biased tools and/equipment's, whereas 7% suffered an injury due to right biased layout of work. 37% of the left handed population believed that their performance would be better if they would have been right hand dominant. Conclusions: Handedness was found to have profound effect in the professional work of dentists in both students studying dentistry as well as in professional dentists.