Knowledge, attitudes, and performance of dental students in relation to sterilization/disinfection methods of extracted human teeth

Dental students use extracted human teeth to learn practical and technical skills before they enter the clinical environment. In the present research, knowledge, performance, and attitudes toward sterilization/disinfection methods of extracted human teeth were evaluated in a selected group of Iranian dental students. In this descriptive cross-sectional study the subjects consisted of fourth-, fifth- and sixth-year dental students. Data were collected by questionnaires and analyzed by Fisher’s exact test and Chi-squared test using SPSS 11.5. In this study, 100 dental students participated. The average knowledge score was 15.9 ± 4.8. Based on the opinion of 81 students sodium hypochlorite was selected as suitable material for sterilization and 78 students believed that oven sterilization is a good way for the purpose. The average performance score was 4.1 ± 0.8, with 3.9 ± 1.7 and 4.3 ± 1.1 for males and females, respectively, with no significant differences between the two sexes. The maximum and minimum attitude scores were 60 and 25, with an average score of 53.1 ± 5.2. The results of this study indicated that knowledge, performance and attitude of dental students in relation to sterilization/disinfection methods of extracted human teeth were good. However, weaknesses were observed in relation to teaching and materials suitable for sterilization.