Orthodontic Treatments Provided by General Dentists in Shiraz, Iran

Some parts of orthodontic treatments, especially in the field of prevention-intervention are defined as general practitioner's responsibility. The aim of this study was to evaluate orthodontic treatments provided by general practitioners in Shiraz. In this cross-sectional and descriptive study, a 12-item questionnaire was sent to 115 general dentists selected through stratified random sampling. The questionnaire was designed for gathering the data about the demographic characteristics of the dentists and their orthodontic treatments. The data were analyzed using SPSS software and Chi-square test. More than half of the recipients reported that they have provided no orthodontic treatment. The most common malocclusions treated by the practitioners were crowding and spacing and space maintenance. A slightly more than 10% of the participants used Edgewise or Straight wire techniques for fixed treatments. The majority of the respondents reported that they received most of their orthodontic knowledge during undergraduate dental training and most of them evaluated the quality of orthodontic training as "Poor" during this course. Practitioners with fewer years of experience provided more orthodontic treatments than the others. Changes in the undergraduate educational system and workshop set ups can be considered as solutions to improve dentist's orthodontic skill and knowledge in preventive - interceptive orthodontics.