Assessment of Basic Knowledge on Orofacial Pain amongst Undergraduate Dental Students

With pain being the major cause of visits to the dental clinic, the basic knowledge of causes for adequate management is paramount for dentists and dentists-in-training to improve the quality of life of patients.

The study was conducted to assess the knowledge of undergraduate dental students regarding orofacial pain (OFP) and how comfortable they are understanding, identifying, and diagnosing different categories of OFP.

A cross-sectional study was carried out amongst penultimate and final year dental students of two dental schools. A modified questionnaire on basic knowledge of OFP which contained 16 questions was adopted to evaluate students' knowledge. Questions also assessed how comfortable the students were diagnosing the different categories of OFP. P value was set at ≤0.05 (exact).

One hundred and four undergraduates participated in the study. The age range was 23-33 years while the mean was 24.3 ± 2.1years. Only 31% got the basic questions correctly. About 51% in both levels claimed they had moderate knowledge (scale 5-7) of pain education, while 64% of final year students felt their knowledge was adequate for their clinical needs, 50% of the penultimate year felt otherwise (p=0.02). All students however believed they needed more teaching on orofacial pain, with the most preferred form of learning being clinic-based teaching (40.4%).

The study showed moderate self-assessed knowledge but low general basic knowledge of OFP by the undergraduate students; possibly a reflection of the curriculum. Therefore, there is a need to improve the curriculum for orofacial pain teachings in dental schools.