Student Perspectives on Integrating an Oral Health Helpline Service Into Dental and Dental Hygiene Education

The University of British Columbia's Faculty of Dentistry developed a helpline service to provide free oral health information, referrals to oral healthcare clinics and aid navigating public dental benefits. Over two academic years, 43 fourth-year dental hygiene students and 29 dental students received education on being a virtual provider for the helpline and participated in experiential rotations as virtual providers. This qualitative study explored undergraduate dental and dental hygiene students' perspectives on integrating an oral health helpline into their curriculum.

This project focuses on students' perspectives as part of a larger study employing constructivist grounded theory to develop a conceptual model for integrating an oral health helpline into a dental and dental hygiene school. Semi-structured individual interviews were conducted with 5 dental and 7 dental hygiene students, audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim and coded using NVivo 12 software. The coding process included initial, focused and theoretical coding, supported by constant comparative analysis. In initial coding, transcripts were reviewed for familiarisation and codes were generated by applying codes to concepts. Focused coding involved selecting a set of codes that were most prevalent and important to the analysis to develop categories that represent groups of codes. Theoretical coding consisted of refining the final categories and connecting the categories to each other.

Three major themes emerged as follows: perceived usefulness, educational components and institutional context. The helpline education improved students' understanding of barriers to oral health care. Dental hygiene students gained confidence in phone communication and providing virtual services, while dental students improved their ability to address patient questions, navigate care and share community resources. Experiential learning was crucial for greater understanding, with students recommending in-person sessions, small group or one-on-one formats, organised resources and experienced instructors. Despite scheduling challenges, the helpline education could be integrated into existing relevant curriculum and distributed across academic years.

Incorporating helpline education into dental programmes enhanced students' understanding of oral healthcare barriers, communications skills and ability to answer patient questions and share resources. This study's insights on helpline curriculum integration offer guidance for other dental programmes considering similar helpline initiatives.