Knowledge and Attitude Towards Choosing Public Health Dentistry as a Choice for Post Graduation among Interns of Dental Colleges in Bangalore City

Abstract

Introduction: In India, before 1980, there were only 39 dental colleges with few dentists being available for services, This scenario changed completely after 1980, with an intense increase in the number of dental colleges, which reached around 240 in 2007. Public Health Dentistry is considered as a non-clinical department, though it is a clinical specialty offering preventive and comprehensive treatment to the masses, and is given less priority by the students as their choice in post-graduation. Hence, the present study was carried out with an aim to explore the Knowledge and attitude towards choosing Public Health Dentistry as a choice for post-graduation among interns of Dental Colleges in Bangalore city. Methods: A pretested closed-ended questionnaire was created on Google forms and forwarded to the interns of various Dental Colleges in Bangalore via email. The first section of the questionnaire consisted of demographic details of the study participant such as name, age, and gender. The second section consisted of questions to evaluate their knowledge and attitude towards Public Health Dentistry. The questionnaire survey was conducted over a period of two months from September to October 2019. Results: 402 out of the total 755 dental interns responded to the questionnaire. Only 2% of respondents took a liking/interest in the subject of Public Health Dentistry during their under graduation, and also were keen to pursue a post-graduate degree in the same. The findings of this study suggest that though a vast majority of interns were aware of the importance and scope of Public Health Dentistry, only a meagre number of interns wanted to pursue post-graduation in the subject.