Factors associated with refusal to treat HIV-infected patients: the results of a national survey of dentists in Canada. (1/96)

OBJECTIVES: This study investigated dentists refusal to treat patients who have HIV. METHODS: A survey was mailed to a random sample of all licensed dentists in Canada, with 3 follow-up attempts (n = 6444). Data were weighted to allow for probability of selection and nonresponse and analyzed with Pearson's chi 2 and multiple logistic regression. RESULTS: The response rate was 66%. Of the respondents, 32% had knowingly treated HIV-infected patients in the last year; 16% would refuse to treat HIV-infected patients. Respondents reported willingness to treat HIV-infected patients (81%), injection drug users (86%), hepatitis B virus-infected patients (87%), homosexual and bisexual persons (94%), individuals with sexually transmitted disease(s) (94%), and recipients of blood and blood products (97%). The best predictors of refusal to treat patients with HIV were lack of ethical responsibility (odds ratio = 9.0) and items related to fear of cross-infection or lack of knowledge of HIV. CONCLUSIONS: One in 6 dentists reported refusal to treat HIV-infected patients, which was associated primarily with respondents' lack of belief in an ethical responsibility to treat patients with HIV and fears related to cross-infection. These results have implications for undergraduate, postgraduate, and continuing education.  (+info)

Ethics in an aging society: challenges for oral health care. (2/96)

Health and aging are deeply meaningful and complex realities. The demographic reality of the Canadian population in the 21st century requires an in-depth understanding of the health care goals of older people, an analysis of the attitudes toward older people that affect societal decision making and the educational and policy changes required to effect positive change. Viewing these issues through the lens of oral health care allows an analysis of health care goals for the older population. A look at representative cases where oral health needs were not met uncovers some of the attitudes and values about oral health, the goals of health care and the unique circumstances of older people that present barriers to appropriate care.  (+info)

Teaching ethics in dental schools: trends, techniques, and targets. (3/96)

The importance of promoting ethical behavior in dental students is reflected in the emphasis on formal ethics teaching within the curricula of most dental schools. Over the last three decades, dental educators have addressed the need for ethics training and examined varied teaching approaches. Today, state-of-the-art ethics education has moved from purely didactic instruction to more interactional teaching methods that promote student introspection and group problem-solving. This paper provides an overview of trends in ethics teaching in dental schools and the current teaching approaches advocated in health science schools. In addition, future needs in dental ethics education are explored including the importance of addressing the unique aspects of the dental education environment.  (+info)

The face of a child: children's oral health and dental education. (4/96)

Dental care is the most common unmet health care need of children. Those at increased risk for problems with oral health and access to care are from poor or minority families, lack health insurance, or have special health care needs. These factors place more than 52 percent of children at risk for untreated oral disease. Measures of access and parental report indicate unmet oral health needs, but do not provide guidance as to the nature of children's oral health needs. Children's oral health needs can be predicted from their developmental changes and position in the life span. their dependency and environmental context, and current demographic changes. Specific gaps in education include training of general dentists to care for infants and young children and those with special health care needs, as well as training of pediatric providers and other professionals caring for children in oral health promotion and disease prevention. Educational focus on the technical aspects of dentistry leaves little time for important interdisciplinary health and/or social issues. It will not be possible to address these training gaps without further integration of dentistry with medicine and other health professions. Children's oral health care is the shared moral responsibility of dental and other professionals working with children, parents, and society. Academic dental centers hold in trust the training of oral health professionals for society and have a special responsibility to train future professionals to meet children's needs. Leadership in this area is urgently needed.  (+info)

Small business needs assessment: a comparison of dental educators' responses with SBDC survey results. (5/96)

A primary focus of dental education is to teach students the knowledge, skills, and values essential for practicing dentistry. However, the preparation of dentists to manage a business is frequently cited as inadequate. A survey was prepared to assess teachers' opinions of business instructional topics: challenges; desired training; employee benefits; learning resources; importance of business topics; and appropriateness of time allocations. The purpose of this project is to compare opinions of teachers of dental practice management with key management aspects reported for service businesses by the Small Business Development Center (SBDC). Practice management teachers from forty-eight (89 percent) schools responded to the survey. They indicated that several challenges confronting dentists are similar to other service businesses. Dentists, however, rank customer relations appreciably higher. In order of importance of teaching topics, the practice management teachers rank ethics and personnel management as a high priority and planning as a low priority. Awareness of the similarities and differences in the perceptions of practice management teachers and businesspeople may result in instructional improvements.  (+info)

Ethics--dental registration in the seventeenth and early eighteenth century. (6/96)

In the histories of dentistry, some mention is made of the licensing of tooth-drawers, and those who provided dental healthcare before the term Dentist started to become general in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. One of the most striking references to licensing appears in a little piece of doggerel printed under a 1768 print by Dixon after Harris.  (+info)

Ethics--dentistry and tooth-drawing in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in England. Evidence of provision at all levels of society. (7/96)

The popularity of caricature at the end of the eighteenth century allows a researcher to observe the social as well as the technical side of dentistry as it was then available throughout the kingdom. The value of these caricatures is further enhanced by the unconscious inclusion of everyday objects which a narrative account would not think it worthwhile including, even if such narrative account had existed.  (+info)

Banning live patients as test subjects on licensing examinations. (8/96)

The use of live patients on the licensing examinations was a part of dentistry for almost the entire twentieth century and continues up until today. Considerable new debate about the appropriateness of using live patients as test subjects began in the mid-1990s and culminated in the passage of a resolution in the American Dental Association's year 2000 House of Delegates calling for an end to this practice by the year 2005. The live patient examination tests a narrow range of clinical skills, creates ethical dilemmas for candidates, for the host institution, and for the profession, and is unable to distinguish between those ready to assume independent practice from those who are not yet at that level of competence. There are other ways to test for such readiness including proposals in New York State to substitute a postdoctoral year or mannequins in place of live subjects. The public and the dental profession will be better off by developing alternative licensing tests to the use of live subjects.  (+info)