Attitudes toward and knowledge of collaboration of dental and medical practice among medical students in Southern India: a cross-sectional questionnaire survey

Introduction

One of the commonly neglected health issues globally is oral health, and the impact of oral diseases has significant effects on individuals, communities and global health care systems.¹ The evolution of professional health care education over the years is yet to compete with the demographical challenges and inequalities faced, which causes a burden on the system to fight the disease spread, and utilize the scientific knowledge and advanced technology with increasing complexity in the system. In addition to this, there is existing gap in imparting training to medical professionals about importance of oral health and its impact on general health.^2,3

In order to achieve greater resource efficiency and upgrade the standard of care and comprehensiveness by reducing duplication and gaps in services, interprofessional collaboration is a key to success.⁴ All parties will benefit from improved professional cooperation between medical and dental practitioners and better educate the public. Overlooking underlying health problems while treating a patient is what most dentists do while they focus on the diagnosis and treatment of oral diseases. Likewise, doctors may fail to notice their patient’s oral health problems which could result in initiation of a long-lasting medical illness. Enhancing health care services through inter-professional collaboration between medical and dental practitioners is therefore essential.⁵ An article was published after the First Systemic Health Round Table Discussion to advocate for better medical-dental collaborative practice. Inter-professional collaboration enhances communication and decision-making, enabling a synergistic influence of grouped knowledge and skills.⁶ Due to limited literature and emphasis on this topic, we decided to conduct this study to improve the understanding and importance of the same.

Hence the purpose of this study is to evaluate the knowledge and attitudes of the medical students towards collaboration between medical and dental practice in South India to understand the shortcomings and address them with a better strategy.

Methods

Results

A total of 250 questionnaires were distributed and 234 responses were obtained from medical students of 3^rd year, 4^th year and interns from medical colleges in coastal South India indicating a response rate of 93.6%. Those who returned a blank or incomplete questionnaire were excluded. The mean age of the participants was 21.5 years with 58.36% respondents being female and 41.64% male. Out of total respondents, 43.77% were 3^rd years, 39.9% were 4^th years and rest (17%) accounted for interns.

There was no statistically significant difference in knowledge and attitude based on gender, except that the female students were significantly more (p value-0.00) aware of interprofessional referral practice before elective medical surgeries (Table 1). Overall analysis of gender-based difference in responses indicated that females are more well informed and have increased positive attitude than males regarding the intended collaboration.

Most of the students agreed that oral health was an integral part of systemic health with analysis leading to median score of 5 (Table 2), but a statistically significant difference in the attitudes of medical students based on study year was seen when asked about attending compulsory rotation in dentistry with senior students showing negative attitude. The majority of participants had adequate knowledge regarding the medical-dental relationship, but almost 47% had very limited awareness about the existing relationship, which was assessed by questions 2, 3, 4 and 5. While comparing the groups based on study year there was a statistically significant difference in knowledge (Table 2) with p value of 0.003, when asked about importance of salivary bio markers. Moreover when asked about physicians’ active role in motivating their patients for regular dental check-up, there was a statistically significant difference (p value-0.013) in responses given by groups based on year of study indicating their negative attitude. However, 82% of the medical students were of the opinion that dental check-ups should be included in the health packages under health insurance.

Most students were aware about the necessity for interdisciplinary practice but only 61.8% agreed to the foster integral collaboration; 12.8% disagreed and the rest were unsure. Medical students (61%) gave a median score of 4, and agree that regular interaction is required with dental students to mutually exchange knowledge. Interestingly, 25% of them have replied neutrally, which again indicates a lack of interest with regards to the same.

A statistically significant difference based on age was seen (Table 3) with p value of 0.014 when asked about relation of HIV patient and dental treatment. Participants belonging to 21-25 years age groups showed lesser knowledge regarding the same.

Discussion

This study was used to evaluate the knowledge and attitudes of medical students towards the collaboration of medical and dental practice. Only medical students were involved in this survey to avoid a positive response bias from dental students as they may simply have a more positive disposition towards the study objective, as shown in a study by Zhang in 2015.⁷

Overall, medical students showed fairly good knowledge and positive attitude towards medical and dental collaboration in congruence with the results obtained from the study by Zhang. But analysis of groups within each parameter showed a significant difference. Based on year of study, it was found that students from third and final years of study had more positive attitudes than the interns, unlike results obtained by Zhang.⁷ More than half the participants, particularly the interns, did not agree to attend compulsory rotation in dentistry (p value 0.017), contrary to finding in which Hendricson and Cohen concluded this rotationship was not only beneficial but essential.⁸

Although nearly 50% participants had fair knowledge regarding the oral-systemic link, many participants were confused when asked if it was mandatory to undergo an oral check-up before pregnancy. Sufficient research has shown that severe periodontal disease in pregnant women predisposes them to a higher risk of delivering preterm and/or low-birth weight of the new born.^9,10 Offenbacher found mothers with periodontal disease are at a risk seven times more than mothers without.¹¹ When asked about a link between diabetes and oral health, students seemed to have limited knowledge regardless of year of study. In addition, previous investigations have established an association between either type 1 or type 2 diabetes and periodontal diseases to the extent that periodontitis has been called the “sixth complication of diabetes”.^12,13 Interestingly, analysis among gender revealed a statistically significant difference with more knowledge among female participants with regard to questions about criteria to undergo treatment among HIV patients. Though it does not provide any supporting evidence to prove poor knowledge, it does indicate the need for further education among medical students about HIV patients and dental treatment.

While assessing the attitude of the students, we found significant data that junior students advised and motivated their patients to undergo dental check-up regularly, compared to senior students who gave a more of neutral response. One of the reasons for such an attitude from senior students can be because of the concept of social hierarchy which can be due to lack of interprofessional communication and patient management.⁴

In the United States, utilization of oral health care services and the incidence of oral disease are strongly linked to dental insurance coverage.¹⁴ In contrast, in India the dental insurance sector is less prevalent, 40-50% of the medical students strongly feel that dental check-up and some part of treatment must be covered in general health packages.

Around 60% of participants responded positively towards the integral collaboration and interprofessional communication, although 30% students were not sure and the rest disagreed with it. Analysis showed that the third and final year students were more positive than interns which is in contrast to results obtained from a study by Zhang.⁷ The exposure medical students undergo at clinics along with their interest in the subject affects their perception of oral health and its importance on general health. The Indian health education system, which often displays egocentric power relations among healthcare professionals, whereby medical professionals may not consider oral health as an integral part of general health due to a false perception, is threatening this interprofessional collaboration.¹⁵

Students’ attitude is associated with factors such as gender, knowledge of regular dental check-up, and curriculum. Results of a previous study reported that gender could affect a student’s attitude towards medical dental collaboration.^9,16 Questions pertaining to the attitude towards collaboration such as insurance benefits for dental treatments received a more positive response from females than males. When asked about importance of interprofessional communication for exchange of knowledge and better patient care, females gave a greater positive response than males, which can be attributed to higher ego among males.¹⁵

In clinical practice, interprofessional continuing education is a useful means of regulating and stabilizing a professional’s identity and improving teamwork.⁴ Guidelines must be set to improve confidence in a provider’s ability with regard to cases pertaining to both fields and have access to updated knowledge about the collaboration between medical and dental practice.^17,18 The existing body of medical and dental professionals play an important role since they have the ability to lay the guidelines. They can set guidelines for the indications, timing, protocols, and responsibilities of referral and consultation among physicians and dentists. Patients and the community should be made to understand the relationship between oral and systemic health by means of awareness campaigns.¹⁹ In doing so, national health goals can be achieved by reducing these kinds of healthcare disparities.

In our study we have not included dental students to avoid positive response bias. Apart from this, studies with larger sample size should be considered in future, to extrapolate the study results to a larger professional population. Even para-medical healthcare providers can be included as a part of the study to seek better understanding.

Conclusion

Even though medical students showed fairly good knowledge and positive attitude towards dentistry, the analysis within the study groups showed that knowledge and attitude regarding the collaborative practice declined over the academic years among the medical students.

Data availability