Assessment of Dental Environment Stress among Clinical Dentistry Students in Kerman Dental School, Iran, in 2014

Dentistry has been widely acknowledged as being associated with high levels of stress. This stress originates in the process of dental education. The aim of the present study was to evaluate dental environment stress (DES) in students of the School of Dentistry of Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Iran. This cross-sectional study was conducted on 165 students. Data were collected using the Dental Environment Stress Questionnaire (consisting of 32 items in 6 scales) and demographic information questionnaire. Data were analyzed in SPSS software using t-test and ANOVA. P-value was considered at 5%. Of the 165 respondents, 53.3% were women and 78.2% were single. Their mean age was 23.63 ± 2.94 years, and mean score was 16.05 ± 1.10. The mean of DES score was 82.60 ± 14.53 out of a total of 128. In academic factors, fear of exam and failure of the course were the most important stressors. There was a statistically significant association between mean DES score and gender. There was no statistically significant association between mean DES score and marriage status, student`s work, and priority of field selection. The results of the present study were similar to that of previous studies. They showed the existence of DES. Academic factors were one of the most important stressors.