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EDUCATION
Is manual dexterity essential in the selection of dental students?
M. Giuliani,1 C. Lajolo,2 L. Clemente,3 A. Querqui,4 R. Viotti,5 A. Boari6 and C. M. Miani7Objective The purpose of this study was to determine whether basic manual dexterity (BMD) could be an important parameter in selecting students for the Degree in Dentistry (CLOPD) and to assess whether initial manual dexterity in students admitted to the CLOPD can improve with training in pre-clinical and clinical practice. Design Observational study. Setting The study was carried out at the Catholic University of Rome, in ve consecutive academic years. Subjects and methods Four hundred and thirty-three subjects (262 males and 171 females) were tested (10 different exercises) in ve consecutive years. Two retests were performed after three and ve years respectively from the beginning of the experimentation. Main outcome measures The scores of individual exercises were averaged for each candidate, assessing the mean value of basic manual dexterity score (BMDS). Results It was possible to observe some differences among candidates coming from different types of high schools, since those having a prior university degree or a scientic high school degree proved better than those with classical or vocational high school qualications (p < 0.05). A statistically signicant improvement of BMDS has been observed in students who attended the CLOPD for at least 32 months. Conclusions Data obtained revealed that basic manual dexterity is not essential in the selection of dental students. Students who could follow training signicantly improved in their manual ability.
INTRODUCTION
During the past few years, tests for evaluating future performances have been increasingly used for the purpose of hiring employees and selecting university students. High School grade point average (GPA), aptitude tests, psychometric tests, interviews and manual dexterity tests were all studied in order to predict the students future success. In the United States, the Dental Admission Test (DAT) was introduced at the beginning
as well as those proposed by Wilson7 and
by Suddick,8 have been used to correlate manual dexterity with success in dental schools. Although interesting, some such studies produced controversial results and none reached any clear conclusion. In any case, while many of the studies could fairly well correlate manual dexterity with academic and pre-clinical laboratory skills, few of them were set...