Dental Students' Opinions Regarding Caries Management by Risk Assessment Program

Dental schools have begun to integrate comprehensive Caries Management by Risk Assessment programs into their clinics. Objectives: To evaluate dental students' opinions regarding newly implemented Caries Management by Risk Assessment Program in the third- and fourth-year operative clinic at the University of Florida, College of Dentistry. Methods: Students' opinions were assessed by eleven questions using a 5-point Likert-type response scale ranging from strongly agree to strongly disagree. Results: The response rate for 3rd year was 65.5% (55/84) and for 4th year 43.4% (36/83). Almost 80% of 3rd year respondents felt that caries risk assessment (CRA) is not complicated compared to 67.5% of 4th year respondents. About 67% of 3rd year and 37.8% of 4th year respondents felt that CRA helps them to identify caries risks, and 53.7% of 3rd year and only 22.3% of 4th year respondents felt that CRA helped their patients understand their risks. 48% of the 3rd year respondents felt that CRA helped them to plan appropriate preventive treatment compared to 27% of 4th year respondents. 59.3% of 3rd year and only 35.1% of 4th year respondents will use CRA to plan preventive treatment in the future. 57.8% of total respondents felt that training in preventive dentistry should be increased, 31.1% did not have opinion and only 11.1% of respondents disagreed. Over 70% of 3rd year respondents and 41.7% of 4th year respondents were satisfied with the program. Conclusions: Junior level students seem to have more favorable opinions of the program than seniors. Most of the respondents were satisfied with the program and surprisingly high number felt that training of preventive dentistry should be increased. This study supports the implementation of CRA in dental school environment. Further research is needed to evaluate the success of the program to identify high-risk patients and ways to motivate senior students.