Anxiety, fear, awareness and economic influence amongst Indian dentists during the COVID-19 outbreak

Arunoday Kumar; Rajesh. S. Nongthombam; Barun Kant; Syeda Shamima Nastaran Quazi; Nuzhat Ara; Shishir Kumar

doi:10.53730/ijhs.v6nS5.9752

Authors

Arunoday Kumar
dr.arunodayk@gmail.com
Assistant Professor, Dept. of Prosthodontics and Crown & Bridge, Dental College, Regional Institute of Medical Sciences, Imphal, Manipur, India
Rajesh. S. Nongthombam Associate Professor, Dept. of Prosthodontics and Crown & Bridge, Dental College, Regional Institute of Medical Sciences, Imphal, Manipur, India
Barun Kant Lecturer, Department of Prosthodontics and Crown & Bridge, Hazaribag College of Dental Sciences and Hospital, Hazaribag, Jharkhand, India
Syeda Shamima Nastaran Quazi Dispur Hospital Private Ltd, Dispur,Assam, India
Nuzhat Ara PhD Scholar, Department of Oral Medicine and Radiology, Jaipur Dental College, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India
Shishir Kumar Dental Surgeon, Maa Shanti Dental Clinic, Private Practice, Purnea, Bihar

Keywords:

Anxiety, Coronavirus, North- Eastern Indian dentists, Economic, Practice management

Abstract

Dental practitioners are at risk due to direct contact with possibly infected patients as front-line health care professionals during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Therefore, it is of interest to measure the anxiety, fear, awareness and economic effect of the epidemic on Indian dentists at work .This study was conducted utilizing an online survey questionnaire and Google forms from August 22nd to August 23rd, 2021. A total of 485 doctors took part in the survey. The questionnaire included open-ended, closed-ended, and Likert five-point scale items to measure anxiety, awareness, and the financial impact of COVID-19 on dentists. The Mann-Whitney test was used for two groups. The Kruskal–Wallis test was used as a post-hoc test for multigroup comparisons. The average age of the participants was 36.5 ± 9.2 years, with the majority (75.21%) being just graduate dentists. More than 80.1% of interviewees expressed concern about contracting COVID-19. Younger dentists and females have higher levels of anxiety than older dentists. The level of awareness and practice of COVID-19 precautions and infection-control measures among these dentists (94.1%) was found to be high. This is due to age, qualification, and designation (except GP vs. Specialist).

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