Assessment of Anxiety in Dental Practice among Dental Students of Himachal Pradesh: A Cross-sectional Study

Abstract

Abstract Background: The demand of excellence and proficiency among professionals is a threat to vocational well-being. The anxiety inherited by dental students is reflected through poor physical and psychological health, loss of interest leading absenteeism, and substance abuse with decreased clinical skills and competencies. Aim: To assess the anxiety in dental practice among dental students of Himachal Pradesh. Methods: The sources of data during this cross-sectional were the dental students studying in one government and four private dental colleges of Himachal Pradesh (India). The information included were demographic details and Dental Anxiety Questionnaire adapted from a previous study. The Dental Anxiety Questionnaire consisted of 37 questions with six anxiety-related constructs of academic (6 items), communication (4 items), investigation (7 items), diagnosis (4 items), treatment (8 items), and deficiencies (8 items). Each item was scored on four-point Likert scale and scores of 38–74 were considered mild anxiety, 75–111 moderate anxiety, and 112–148 severe anxiety. Results: The mean anxiety total score was 83.89 ± 17.49 and within the six constructs, deficiencies and error in treatment-related anxiety showed the highest and communication and health team-related anxiety showed the lowest mean anxiety total scores. The floor and ceiling effect was reported to be 2.53% and the individual item to the total item correlation was above the recommended accepted level of 0.3 for majority of items which indicated good content validity for the scale used. The Cronbach’s alpha was found to be 0.89 (unstandardized), which suggested the good internal consistency. Conclusion: Understanding the various types of anxiety related to dental students in the clinical dental practice is essential in the process of designing and evaluation of an effective and integrated dental curriculum. The dental curriculum should be well oriented in achieving a desired optimal anxiety for better academic excellence and clinical success of the dental students.