Self-reported stress among senior dental students during complete denture procedures

AIMS: Stress is a common problem that can have a considerable impact on student performance and subsequently the quality of treatment given to the patients. This study aimed to investigate the levels and reasons of stress among senior dental students when they perform different complete denture clinical procedures. SETTINGS AND DESIGN: A questionnaire was designed and distributed electronically among senior dental students of 19 universities in Saudi Arabia. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The students were asked to score the levels of stress during five complete denture clinical steps on a scale from zero to ten and report factors contributing to it. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS USED: Descriptive statistics and inferential statistics were carried out by One-way ANOVA and independent t-test to compare stress scores between different procedures. RESULTS: A total of 419 responses were collected, 195 (46.5%) males and 224 (53.5%) females. One-Way ANOVA revealed statistically significant difference in the mean stress scores between the five procedures (P < 0.001). The highest mean stress score was for border molding and final impression procedure (4.06 ± 2.664) and jaw relation (4.20 ± 2.690). Moreover, the Stress scores were significantly higher among females when compared to males in all procedures (P < 0.05) except the placement of final denture (P > 0.05). CONCLUSION: Border molding, final impression, and jaw relation records cause more stress for dental students than the other complete denture procedures. Difficulty of these two procedures was the most common reported stress provoking factors.