Knowledge of Medical Interns Regarding Periodontitis in Sari and Babol Schools of Medicine in 2013-14

Physicians play a pivotal role in guiding patients with oral and dental diseases. Cooperation between physicians and dentists is necessary for suitable and timely patient referral, as well as diagnosis and treatment of oral diseases. This study was conducted to investigate the knowledge of medical interns in medical schools of Sari and Babol regarding periodontal diseases in 2013-14.
This analytical descriptive study was performed in 80 medical interns in Sari and Babol medical schools during 2013-14. A questionnaire was designed on the nature and risk factors for periodontal diseases and the association between systemic and periodontal diseases; in doing so, the available articles in this regard were employed. Content and face validities of the questionnaire were established by two periodontal specialists. In order to evaluate the reliability of the questionnaire, test-retest was performed; spearman correlation coefficient was 0.8. To analyze the data, Chi-squared test was run using SPSS, version 20. P-value less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant.
This study was performed on 37 interns in School of Medicine of Sari (46.25%; 47% males and 53% females) and 43 interns in School of Medicine in Babol (53.75%; 49% males and 51% females). The mean overall knowledge scores of medical interns about periodontal diseases in Sari and Babol were 6.27±3.27 (medium) and 12.00±5.23 (very good), respectively, showing no significant differences (P>0.0001).
Given the importance of prevention of oral and dental diseases, especially periodontal diseases, further training for medical students and planning for promoting public knowledge seem to be necessary.