PREVALENCE OF PSYCHOLOGICAL HEALTH DISORDERS AMONG DENTISTRY STUDENTS

Abstract

Aims: To investigate the prevalence of psychological health disorders among dentistry students and evaluate whether these disorders originated before or during dentistry studies.

Methods: A questionnaire survey was carried out among 3rd – 5th year dentistry students of Vilnius University (n=84), Medical University of Lublin (n=361) and UiT The Arctic University of Norway (n=28) in 2016. The study included students who had started dental practice with a patient. Final response rate was 78.8%.

Results: The majority of dental students (90.7%, n=427) felt that dental practice is psychologically difficult. Prevalence of psychological health disorders among dentistry students was high: 53.4% (n=251) suffer from mental exhaustion rarely or sometimes and 20% experience it chronically; 60.2% (n=283) suffer from nervousness rarely or sometimes and 15.7% are nervous on a chronic basis. The majority of disorders were acquired during their studies. Significantly fewer 3rd year students consider dental practice as psychologically difficult (p=0.003); significantly fewer 5th year students felt nervous before working with a patient (p=0.04) compared to other students. Significantly fewer students of the Medical University of Lublin suffered from nervousness (p=0.008), mental exhaustion (p=0,002) or experience stress during the work (p=0.009) and felt nervous before the work with a patient (p>0.0001), students of Vilnius University experience depression (p=0.032) or anxiety (p>0.0001) significantly more than students of other universities.

Conclusion: This study showed early emerging psychological health problems which affect dentists in their daily practice starting to develop during undergraduate dentistry studies. They could be the result of high demands for studies of the curriculum and the specificity of practical work with patients. Therefore it is necessary to teach dental students how to deal with variety of academic and occupational factors that affect their psychological wellbeing.