Atitudes e comportamentos de saúde oral em estudantes de medicina dentária em Portugal e na Holanda

: um estudo comparativo

Abstract

Introduction: Today’s dentistry students are going to be the future dentists responsible for oral health education and promotion. Oral health professionals’ attitudes and behaviours towards their own health reflect their understanding about the importance of oral problems prevention and may contribute to the improvement of their patient´s oral health. Objectives: To compare oral health attitudes and behaviours among Portuguese and Dutch students. Materials and Methods: We conducted a cross sectional study in a sample of 281 (58,1%) dentistry students of Radboud University Nijmegen and 201 (41,9%) of Portuguese Catholic University, Viseu. Data collection was performed through a selfadministered questionnaire about oral health attitudes and behaviours, which included the Hiroshima University Dental Behavioural Inventory (HUDBI). Results: We found that 69,5% of Portuguese students and 63,3% of Dutch students adopted less adequate oral health attitudes and behaviours. The average scores of HUDBI obtained by the Dutch sample was higher than the Portuguese sample (8,0±1,2 vs. 7,8±1,5; p=0,045). Dutch students of the 1st and 2nd years, whose parents were not oral health professionals and were non-smokers had better oral health attitudes and behaviours compared to Portuguese students (p=0,013; p=0,017; p=0,048; p=0,047; respectively). Conclusion: There is a wide variability in relation to oral health attitudes and behaviours among students from different countries and our study showed superior results. Still, Dutch students’ oral health attitudes and behaviours were better than the Portuguese. It is very important to change the way we do oral health education. The planning of teaching strategies for oral health behavioural changes should give importance to teaching self-care techniques, towards to alert to the perception of risk factors what are in the origin of oral diseases.

Date of Award	29 Jul 2015
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Nélio Jorge Veiga (Supervisor) & Andreia Sofia de Paiva Figueiredo (Co-Supervisor)