Aims/Objectives: To determine the benefit of twice daily toothbrushing on newly erupted first permanent molars. To investigate, through the Health Belief Model, how parents' beliefs influence the likelihood of their children brushing twice a day. To identify aspects of a toothbrushing intervention programme that can be used in general dental practice. Design: Randomised controlled trial. Setting: Schools in deprived communities in Scotland. Participants: 461, 5‐year‐old children. Interventions/methods: Supervised toothbrushing on schooldays with a 1,000ppm chalk‐based fluoride toothpaste for two years. A school and home‐based incentive scheme including toothbrushing charts, 6‐monthly dental examinations and parental questionnaires. Main outcome measures: Caries increment and twice daily toothbrushing. Results: In the control group, children who brushed once a day or less had 64% more caries than those who brushed at least twice a day (P=0.001). In the intervention group this difference in caries was reduced to 16% (P>0.05). The most significant parental belief explaining variation in twice‐daily brushing was whether parents feel strongly that there is time to check their child's toothbrushing (P=0.0001). The odds of these parents reporting that their child brushes twice daily are nearly three times greater. 95% of parents felt that toothbrushing charts would be a good way for dentists in practice to encourage children to brush regularly. Conclusions: The benefit of twice daily toothbrushing on caries development in newly erupted first permanent molar teeth is around 50% compared to brushing once a day or less. Parents' beliefs do influence the likelihood of their children brushing twice a day. Key parts of the intervention programme can be used when children attend general dental practice and would be welcomed by parents.

From 1990, Behavioural Sciences have become a requisite subject of dental undergraduate curricula across the UK (2). However, subject matter taught varies from school to school (4). The aim of this study was to determine the views and experiences of senior dental undergraduates in applying their behavioural sciences teaching across a range of clinical situations. A questionnaire survey was designed in which 5 UK Dental Schools were included to provide a countrywide geographic distribution and where >75% of senior students in each Dental School participated. The questions required the students to evaluate their psychosocial skills in 4 main areas: dentist/patient interactions; enhancing preventive behaviour; anxiety management; coping with personal stress. 252 students participated, 43% were male. In general, students valued their behavioural sciences teaching and 84% rated its inclusion in the curriculum as important. Some patient management situations had been infrequently encountered in their clinical experience and their confidence in dealing with these situations was low. The data was entered into a stepwise logistic regression to determine which factors explained the variation in reported confidence. In relation to dentist-patient interactions and preventive aspects (9 aspects), significant variables were how well students felt they were taught and how often they encountered the situations. Gender contributed to explaining variation in 4 of these aspects. In dealing with patient aggression, men were over 7x more confident than women (Odd's ratio 7.32), but in changing patients' attitudes to oral health, women were more than 2x as confident as men (Odd's ratio 2.08). In anxiety management and dealing with personal stress, additional variables entered the model and these were age, gender and Dental School. For most aspects of confidence in anxiety management, the quality of teaching to manage these situations was the key variable. In conclusion, this survey has provided an evaluation of UK students' perceived psychosocial skills in a range of clinical settings. This should encourage educators to improve curricular content to support the development of clinical competency in this area.

Dental fear is a widespread problem that represents one of the major barriers to dental care. This report describes a case study of a 12-year-old boy who presented with dental phobia characterized as 'fear of catastrophe', 'generalized dental fear' and 'fear of specific stimuli'. The referral came from his general dental practitioner who had been unable to carry out even the simplest dental procedure on him. The patient required prevention, conservation and root canal therapy. The case illustrates the use of physical strategies, including muscle relaxation and relaxation breathing; practice strategies, including graded exposure and cognitive strategies, combined with individual control methods and inhalation sedation to successfully complete the dental treatment plan.

In 1990, the GDC published its recommendations on the teaching of behavioural sciences. A study of sociological and psychological teaching in the dental undergraduate curriculum has shown a great deal of variation between the 14 dental schools in the United Kingdom. Most of this teaching was also theoretical and at a pre-clinical level. Should skills and applied psychology be given an increased emphasis in the core clinical content of the undergraduate curriculum?

This paper describes an active learning-based education tool which enables dental students to learn preventive techniques relevant to patient dental health behaviour. 2 studies were conducted involving 33, 2nd year (study 1) and 9, 3rd year (study 2) undergraduate dental students. In study 1, snacking behaviour and its antecedents were analysed from detailed 3-day diet diaries completed by the students. Study 2 entailed the students changing one aspect of their sugar/diet behaviour using self-management techniques. It is concluded that dental students can successfully (a) identify antecedents to sugar snacking behaviours on several levels, i.e., cognitive, emotional and situational, (b) set goals and use behaviour change techniques to modify these behaviours, and (c) appreciate that this experience is relevant to similar preventive techniques that they will use in clinical practice. Training in the application of these skills to their own maladaptive behaviours provides a strong educational tool based on psycho-educational theories.

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This paper describes a novel method of teaching and assessing relaxation techniques using a controlled chairside simulation model. 50 pre‐clinical dental undergraduates provided an evaluation of the teaching model as part of their basic clinical skills teaching. Students were required to demonstrate applied relaxation techniques according to 2 pre‐selected clinical vignettes. Inter‐observer reliability of assessing student competence was calculated on a varied sample (n=9) using 2 independent observers and found to be adequate. The majority of the students viewed the teaching and assessment method as interesting and clinically relevant. However, a few students reported that the method was less advantageous than using a real patient. It is concluded that using vignettes as part of clinical training accompanied by video‐based feedback provides a resourceful learning tool for pre‐clinical teaching in the absence of patient contact.