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Maintaining dental implants do general dental practitioners have the necessary knowledge?
I N B R I E F
Investigates the current level of dental
implant education in relation to General
Dental Council and Association of Dental
Education Europe requirements.
Reports some interesting opinions
relating to the current implant education.
Identies the barriers in the provision of
dental implants in general dental practice.
Makes recommendations for the
implementation of a holistic approach in
undergraduate dental implant education.
RESEARCH
S. Jayachandran,*1 B. S. Bhandal,2 K. B. Hill1 and A. D. Walmsley1
VERIFIABLE CPD PAPER
Objective The aim of this study was to understand the opinion of general dental practitioners about the current level of implant education at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Materials and methods A questionnaire was sent to the general dental practitioners working in a group of practices in the West Midlands, UK. The completed responses were analysed. Results Ninety-one out of101 dentists responded to the questionnaires (95.6%). Sixty-seven (77%) dentists stated that they learnt only theoretical aspects of dental implants during their undergraduate training. The majority of them stated that the training they received was not adequate. In addition, few barriers in dental implant provision by general dentists were also identied in the survey. The main barriers were risk of failures (56.3%), to avoid complications (65.5%) and the cost of learning (51.7%). The results were correlated to the implant competences set by the regulatory organisations such as General Dental Council and Association of Dental Education Europe. Conclusion The present study conrmed that the current implant education at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels in the UK does not instil condence to the GDPs to provide and maintain dental implants.
INTRODUCTION
The adult dental health survey 2009, reported a 6% decrease in the average number of edentate adults in England compared to the previous surveys.13 Similar statistics of increased tooth retention have been reported in other Western countries.4,5 In addition, patient expectations have also increased with respect to aesthetics and function. Therefore, advanced treatment planning including implants has become inevitable in modern dentistry.6 Such treatment planning challenges the general dental practitioner who has not necessarily received specialist training to deal with implant restored mouths. The need to maintain or intervene in the maintenance of implants is...