How the COVID-19 Pandemic Affects Risk Awareness in Dentists: A Scoping Review

Thomas Gerhard Wolf, Leonardo de Col, Seyed Ahmad Banihashem Rad, Paolo Castiglia, Antonella Arghittu, Mina Cannavale and Guglielmo Campus
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Thomas Gerhard Wolf: Department of Restorative, Preventive and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, 3012 Bern, Switzerland
Leonardo de Col: Department of Restorative, Preventive and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, 3012 Bern, Switzerland
Seyed Ahmad Banihashem Rad: Department of Restorative, Preventive and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, 3012 Bern, Switzerland
Paolo Castiglia: Department of Surgery, Microsurgery and Medicine Sciences, School of Dentistry, University of Sassari, Viale San Pietro 3/c, 07100 Sassari, Italy
Antonella Arghittu: Department of Surgery, Microsurgery and Medicine Sciences, School of Dentistry, University of Sassari, Viale San Pietro 3/c, 07100 Sassari, Italy
Mina Cannavale: Independent Researcher, 81030 Casaluce, Italy
Guglielmo Campus: Department of Restorative, Preventive and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, 3012 Bern, Switzerland

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 9, 1-14

Abstract: Dentists are on the frontline of infection, especially when it comes to respiratory viruses like the new coronavirus. The purpose of this paper is to conduct a scoping review to better understand dentists’ risk awareness, awareness of COVID-19 symptoms, preventive measures, and effective methods of COVID-19 infection prevention and management. This paper systematically assesses the published literature on dentistry and COVID-19. Various electronic databases including Ovid MEDLINE, Scopus, Embase, and MEDLINE via PubMed were searched up to 9 September 2021. Overall, 39 papers were included. Almost the entirety of dentists (94.5%) reported awareness of the three most common COVID-19 symptoms, and a risk awareness score of about 90% was shown, while 88.2% of dentists reported adopting preventive measures. More than 50% did not want to treat infected people. While 70.3% of dentists recommended usage of N95 masks, the rate of dentists using them was below 40%. Sufficient awareness of risks during the pandemic was found in dentists. Although they were using preventive measures, there remains upside potential for adopting all recommended measures. Further, the usage of N95 masks is improvable, even though the benefit of wearing them could not be confirmed.

Keywords: dentistry; dentist; COVID-19; review; risk awareness (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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