The Evaluation of Knowledge among Dental Specialists about Common Medical Emergencies in Dental Offices in Mashhad-Iran in 2009-2010

Most of Medical emergencies which take place in dental offices could be life-threatening. Thus, patient's preoperative examination and use of pain and anxiety controlling techniques can reduce these events. In this regard, the knowledge about these medical emergencies is of great importance and all of the dental staff should have sufficient knowledge in diagnosing and the way to manage them. This study aims to evaluate knowledge of dental specialists in diagnosis and treatment of medical emergencies. In this descriptive-analytical study, knowledge of dental specialists about common medical emergencies in dental offices, was assessed during 2009-2010. For this purpose, a questionnaire was designed and its reliability and validity was standardized. Forty-eight office-owner dental specialists answered the questionnaire and the recorded data were analyzed using descriptive analysis, Pearson correlation coefficient, student-t test, one-way ANOVA and Mann-Whitney through SPSS software. In this study, knowledge level of 54.2% of dental specialists was revealed to be good, 31.3% moderate and 14.6% was poor. The mean score did not show any significant difference in both sexes (P=0.124). Correlation between knowledge and age was negative which indicates that the rate of knowledge decreases in proportion to age, although this was not statistically significant (P=0.510). The result of this study revealed that the knowledge of dental specialists about diagnosis and management of dental emergencies did not prove to be satisfactory. Therefore, we suggest that more attention should be paid to this issue during postgraduate and general courses. In addition, educational courses for the dentists about approaches to medical emergencies in dental offices results in better knowledge of dentists towards these incidents.