Baaij, I.R. (2022) De impact van het behandelen van angstige patiënten op de tandarts – een onderzoek onder algemeen practici en angsttandartsen. thesis, Dentistry.
Full text available on request.Abstract
Introduction: Treating anxious patients has a high impact (for example a high stress level) on the dentist and can eventually lead to a burn-out. Previous studies suggest that treating anxious patients has a different impact on general dentists and dental specialists. However, it is unclear if the impact differs between general dentists and general dentists who had extra education in treating anxious patients, and which factors are involved. The overall question in this study is: How large is the impact of anxious patients on three different groups of dentists, namely: 1) general dentists, 2) general dentists with affinity for treating anxious patients and 3) differentiated dentists in treating anxious patients? When a difference between the groups is found, the goal of this study is to use this knowledge for the recognition of stress and ways of coping with de impact of anxious patients for dentist. Materials and methods: Online surveys (19 questions) were sent by e-mail to above mentioned dentists. The impact was described in two ways, namely ‘nature’ and ‘intensity’. Different factors who had possible impact on these two aspects were incorporated as questions in de survey. The factors were divided in four categories; demographic factors (sex, age, country of study and working years), dentist-related factors (percentage anxious patients in practice, coping style, personality traits, shame of psychological help, thoughts) differentiation (self-efficacy, challenge, experience, vicarious trauma) and other factors (fatigue, emotional reaction, remuneration, appreciation). Multiple one-way ANOVAs have been used to test possible significant differences between the three groups of dentists in two aspects of impact: nature and intensity. Furthermore, multiple linear regression analyses have been used to investigate if the relation between the dependent variable ‘impact’ and the independent variable ‘group of dentists’ is mediated by three variables: sex (man/woman), country of study and working years. Results: The participants were 91 dentists (41 general dentists, 26 general dentists with affinity for treating anxious patients and 24 differentiated dentists in treating anxious patients). The three different groups of dentists differed significantly in de factors ‘percentage anxious patients’, ‘self-efficacy’, ‘challenge’, ‘experience’, ‘stress’ and ‘appreciation’. The factor ‘country of study’ mediates in the relation between ‘impact’ and ‘remuneration’. Discussion: The group differentiated dentists in anxious patients experienced the highest impact of treating anxious patients and the general dentists experienced the lowest impact. An explanation is that the factor ‘percentage anxious patients’ contributed to the calculation of the impact. In fact, the impact could have been even less for them in comparison with the general dentists, because differentiated dentists reported less stress, more appreciation, more experience, more challenge, and more self-efficacy in comparison with general dentists. This could outweigh the possible impact of treating proportionally more patients with anxiety problems. The findings of this study provide valuable information for follow-up research and possible trainings for general dentists to reduce the stress that arises when treating anxious patients.
| Item Type: | Thesis (UNSPECIFIED) |
|---|---|
| Supervisor name: | Bildt, Dr. M.M. and van Tuinen, Dr. M. |
| Faculty: | Medical Sciences |
| Date Deposited: | 04 Apr 2023 11:20 |
| Last Modified: | 04 Apr 2023 11:20 |
| URI: | https://umcg.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/3468 |
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