Brazilian dental students and COVID‐19: A survey on knowledge and perceptions

  1. Maria Gerusa Brito Aragão
  2. Francisco Isaac Fernandes Gomes
  3. Letícia Pinho Maia Paixão‐de‐Melo
  4. Silmara Aparecida Milori Corona

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Abstract

Objective

This study evaluated the knowledge and perceptions of Brazilian dental students about COVID‐19 and the undergraduate clinical practice during the COVID‐19 outbreak by a self‐administered Web‐based questionnaire.

Methods

A social network campaign on Instagram was raised to approach the target population. The survey covered demographic and academic profile, general knowledge, preventive measures and perception about COVID‐19. Descriptive statistics were used to identify frequencies and distributions of variables, which were compared by type of institution and current year of enrolment using the Chi‐square or Fisher's exact tests ( α  = 0.05).

Results

A total of 833 valid responses were received over 10 days. Students were able to identify the incubation period, main symptoms and contagious routes of the disease but struggled in recognising the name of the virus responsible for the pandemic. Hand washing before and after a dental appointment with a patient (97.7%) followed by the use of barriers to protect mucosa (97.2%) were the more frequently recognised measures to prevent COVID‐19 spread in the dental office. As for the perception of COVID‐19, 73.2% of the dental students perceived the disease as severe, whilst only 11.1% of them thought that COVID‐19 is severe only for people presenting risk factors. Dental student's knowledge and perception were associated with the type of institution and year of enrolment.

Conclusion

In summary, the dental students demonstrated an acceptable general knowledge about COVID‐19, but dental schools will need to address gaps in knowledge, preventive measures, and perceptions to ensure a safer return to in person activities.

Article activity feed

  1. Version published to 10.1111/eje.12676
  2. Version published to 10.1101/2020.07.28.20163964v3 on medRxiv
  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.07.28.20163964v2 on medRxiv
  4. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.07.28.20163964: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementIRB: Ethical aspects: This research protocol was approved by our research ethics committee (CAAE: 33608320.5.0000.5419).
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    All statistical tests were performed using the 7.0 GraphPad Prism® software (California, USA).
    GraphPad
    suggested: (GraphPad Prism, RRID:SCR_002798)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    As for the use of an online survey, it is known that it presents limitations (Couper, 2001). However, given the conditions imposed by the pandemics, web-based surveys allow for data collection without disrespecting sanitary measures. Moreover, such surveys present low costs and broad access to subjects, allowing large-scale data collection and processing in a relatively small amount of time (Couper, 2001). In terms of response rates by gender, we observed a proportion comparable to the overall gender distribution of dental students in Brazil, where dentistry is among the ten undergraduate courses with higher proportions of women (INEP, 2019). In terms of participation by Brazilian regional division, we received more than half of our responses from students from dental schools from the Southeast of Brazil, which is where the research was originated and also is the region with higher proportions of dental students, accounting for 43.8% of the total (INEP, 2019). Lastly, dentistry undergraduate courses in Brazil are mostly offered by private institutions, which supports the slightly higher participation of students from private dental schools (INEP 2019) Regarding the dental students’ general knowledge about COVID-19, our results show that while students were able to identify the incubation period, main symptoms and contagious routes of the disease, they struggled in recognizing the name of the virus responsible for the pandemics we are facing in 2020, which is a worrisome probl...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  5. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.07.28.20163964: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementMethodology Ethical aspects This research protocol was approved by our research ethics committee (CAAE: 33608320.5.0000.5419).Randomizationnot detected.Blindingnot detected.Power Analysisnot detected.Sex as a biological variableParticipants were mostly female (80.1%), aging between 18 and 25 years old (85.1%), and studying dentistry at institutions located in the Southeast of Brazil (54.6%).

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    All statistical tests were performed using the 7.0 GraphPad Prism® software (California, USA).
    GraphPad
    suggested: (GraphPad Prism, SCR_002798)

    Data from additional tools added to each annotation on a weekly basis.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore is not a substitute for expert review. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers) in the manuscript, and detects sentences that appear to be missing RRIDs. SciScore also checks to make sure that rigor criteria are addressed by authors. It does this by detecting sentences that discuss criteria such as blinding or power analysis. SciScore does not guarantee that the rigor criteria that it detects are appropriate for the particular study. Instead it assists authors, editors, and reviewers by drawing attention to sections of the manuscript that contain or should contain various rigor criteria and key resources. For details on the results shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  6. Version published to 10.1101/2020.07.28.20163964v1 on medRxiv