The Outcome of a New Teledentistry Initiative in Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-sectional Study

The purpose of this study was to assess the overall satisfaction of a new learning experience and evaluate the outcome of LLUSD's educational teledentistry initiative through a survey based on Kirkpatrick's multidimensional model of training evaluation.

An IRB application was approved (#5210385) for a cross-sectional study that included Loma Linda University School of Dentistry (LLUSD) dental students of the class of 2022 and 2023. The 9-question survey consisted of three sections. The first section included demographic questions on gender and the graduating class. The second section was related to perceived teaching effectiveness, attitude, behavior, and significance. The third section included an open-ended question. The survey was distributed by three student investigators. Descriptive statistics were calculated, and categorical variables were compared using the Chi-squared test (χ² test).

The perceived teaching effectiveness of the newly implemented educational initiative was high for increasing the ability to communicate with patients and for screening and identifying the need for referrals. A majority of students believed that teledentistry is an important means to improve patients' access to dental care and that the School has been providing a good educational environment in providing teledentistry sessions to patients. There were no significant differences in the frequencies of positive and negative responses to all questions (N = 6) by gender and by class (p >0.05, in all instances).

Teledentistry eVisits allowed the continuation of patient contact and initial assimilation of patient information. There is potential for this educational initiative to be more actively and comprehensively implemented in the future.

New educational initiatives allow the continuation of patient contact that will ensure that students will graduate as competent oral health care providers despite challenges imposed by the pandemic.