Interpersonal communications skills for dental hygiene students: a pilot training program

The educational preparation of most oral health professionals specifically has not addressed professional-patient interaction skills. The purpose of this pilot research project was to determine if the Carkhuff model of communication skills training would improve the interpersonal communication skills of junior dental hygiene students.

The pilot training program was designed to assess and improve interpersonal communication skills using an experimental pretest-posttest design. In Spring 1990, twenty-four baccalaureate dental hygiene students were randomly divided into experimental and control groups. The experimental group completed twenty (20) hours of interpersonal skills training based on Carkhuff's Human Resources Development Model. Video demonstrations, patient simulations, and role modeling were used to enhance learning and retention. Data were collected using three instruments: 1. "Acting" patient video interviews were evaluated by three independent raters to assess change in skilled behaviors. 2. A self-report instrument and a scenario/response option questionnaire were completed to examine change in knowledge of communication skills. 3. A self-report emotional empathy score determined the effects of training on the dimension of empathy. These instruments were administered pretraining, post-training, and one year later to assess differences in behavior, knowledge, and empathy due to the training and maturation. Data analysis included a two-way analysis of variance with repeated measures, frequency distributions, means, standard deviations, and Chronbach's coefficient alpha. A Mann Whitney U-test also was calculated to examine the differences in the distribution of the change scores over time.

Post-train results demonstrated significant differences in knowledge but not in behavior. One-year retention scores showed a significant improvement (p<.01) in both knowledge and behavior by the experimental group when compared to the control group. Empathic responsiveness was not related to the training since both groups progressed modestly but at different rates over the 15-month project.

It is important that dental hygiene practitioners have the requisite interpersonal skills to facilitate the partnership between each patient and client in attaining and maintaining optimal oral health. The results of this pilot study support the recommendation that interpersonal communication skills training become an integral part of the dental hygiene curriculum. However, further studies on this aspect of education should be completed in order to verify the results of this study and provide further support for changes in the education and socialization process of dental hygiene professionals.