Knowledge, Attitude and Practice of Dental Interns and Postgraduates towards Managing Medical Emergencies in Dental Chair

Medical emergencies can happen habitually in dental setting. It is ultimately a dentist's responsibility to foresee the situation and manage it effectively. The aim was to assess the knowledge, attitude, and practice of dental interns and postgraduates regarding managing medical emergencies in dental chair.  

A cross-sectional study was conducted for a period of 6 months from June 2021 to November 2021 on postgraduates and dental interns studying in dental colleges in and around the Chennai city. A pre-validated questionnaire consisting of 20 close-ended questions was circulated through Google forms. It consisted of questions on experience of medical emergencies encountered by interns during their graduation, knowledge about the essential drugs and equipment, amount of medical emergency training undertaken by participants, and preparedness of interns in handling of medical emergencies. Extracted data were statistically analysed by the Chi square test.

Of 217 participants, only 50.63% of interns and 49.37% of postgraduates had good knowledge about drugs used in medical emergencies; 71.65% of interns and 28.35% of postgraduates had come across medical emergencies and were confident enough in handling them during their practice. Also, 64.79% of interns and 35.21% of postgraduates were well informed about treating patients with airway obstruction, haemophilia, diabetes, epilepsy, spontaneous bleeding after extraction, acute asthmatic attack, and adrenal crisis.

The majority of postgraduates had a good knowledge about management of medical emergencies in dental chair while the interns lacked confidence in handling some of the medical emergencies.