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Kim, Lee, and Jin: A survey of the understanding of the scope of work undertaken by dental hygienists and chair-side dental assistants among dental students in Seoul
Original Article

Journal of Korean Academy of Oral Health 2019; 43(4): 224-231.

Published online: 26 December 2019

DOI: https://doi.org/10.11149/jkaoh.2019.43.4.224

A survey of the understanding of the scope of work undertaken by dental hygienists and chair-side dental assistants among dental students in Seoul

Kyung-Jun Kim1, Gyorin Lee2, Bo-Hyoung Jin2

1Department of Dentistry, Seoul National University School of Dentistry, Seoul, Korea.

2Department of Preventive & Social Dentistry, Seoul National University School of Dentistry, Seoul, Korea.

Corresponding Author: Bo-Hyoung Jin. Department of Preventive & Social Dentistry, Seoul National University School of Dentistry, 101 Daehak-ro, Jongno-gu, Seoul 03080, Korea. Tel: +82-2-740-8783, Fax: +82-2-765-1722, jjbh@snu.ac.kr

Received 12 November 2019       Revised 2 December 2019       Accepted 3 December 2019

Copyright © 2019 by Journal of Korean Academy of Oral Health

Journal of Korean Academy of Oral Health

(open-access):

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

Objectives

This study was conducted to investigate the awareness of the students currently attending dental colleges/schools in Seoul regarding the scope of work done by a dental hygienist (DH) and a chair-side dental assistant (DA).

Methods

A direct questionnaire survey was conducted among 950 students who currently attend dental colleges/schools in Seoul. We were able to use a total of 458 samples for final analysis after excluding inappropriate ones. The contents of this structuralized survey included the obligation of proper name badge use for dental health care personnel, the legal work scopes of a DH and a DA in accordance with the revised execution of the ‘Legal Acts on Medical Technicians’, and the inclusion/exclusion of such contents from dental colleges/schools curricula. The results were statistically analyzed via the IBM SPSS Statistics 25.0 software.

Results

Many subjects were aware of the difference in scope of work performed by a DH and a DA (P<0.001), but not their legal obligation to wear appropriate name badges in accordance with the ‘Proposal for the Establishment of the Name Badge Standards for Healthcare Practitioners'. The subjects generally showed higher comprehension of the scope of work performed by a DH (74.3%) than that performed by a DA (57.7%). Without the presence of any corresponding curriculum, accurate responses tended to increase with the students' seniority. Most students (94.4%) agreed with the need to include a class that teaches the scope of work performed by a DH and a DA in their school curricula.

Conclusions

We have found that education regarding ‘Name Badge Standards for Healthcare Practitioners’ and classification of a dental assistant's scope of work is lacking in the existing curriculum. Therefore, it is necessary to establish additional curriculum.

Keywords: Chair-side dental assistant, Dental hygienist, Dental student, Scope of work

Figures and Tables

Table 1

Characteristics of the study participants

jkaoh-43-224-i001
Table 2

Awareness of the name badge standards for healthcare practitioners N (%)

jkaoh-43-224-i002

*Chi-square test, P<0.05.

Table 3

Awareness of the work scopes of dental hygienists and chair-side dental assistants N (%)

jkaoh-43-224-i003

*Chi-square test, P<0.05.

Table 4

A percentage of correct answers about work scope

jkaoh-43-224-i004

DH, Dental hygienist; DA, Chair-side dental assistant.

Table 5

Whether dental hygienists and chair-side dental assistants can do their work

jkaoh-43-224-i005

This classification means that each person (dental hygienist and chair-side dental assistants) can perform.

DH, Dental hygienist; DA, Chair-side dental assistant.

Table 6

Curriculum about dental assistants work scope N (%)

jkaoh-43-224-i006
Table 7

Curriculum about dental assistants work scope (detailed)

jkaoh-43-224-i007

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ORCID iDs

Gyorin Lee
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9683-3853

Bo-Hyoung Jin
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3526-6805

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