Impact of gender on attitude toward student-to-student local anesthesia administration

Abstract

Introduction:In the undergraduate dental curriculum, student-to-student administration of first local anesthetic injection remains to be a traditional method in most of the dental institutions. This exercise is often foreseen by heterogeneous emotional responses both in student operator and respondent. Aim: This study evaluated the variations in attitude toward student-to-student LA administration and the associated anxiety levels among the genders. Materials and Methods: 40 female and 24 male preclinical dental students were provided with a questionnaire, containing statements of agreement. The experience and opinion throughout the procedure of first LA mandibular block administration was scored by the students using five-point Likert's scale and their anxiety levels were measured with 'interval scale of anxiety response' (ISAR) before, during and after administration of LA. The results were tested with Chi-Square test and Mann-Whitney test was used to know the significance of gender variation. Result: The perception of the operators as well as the recipient on mandibular anesthetic block injection analyzed by chi-square test showed significant values (P < 0.05) for all the statements. However, the gender variation performed by means of Mann-Whitney test demonstrated no significant statistical results. The anxiety evaluation using Mann-Whitney test showed significant variation among the genders both as an operator and respondent, except for the anxiety level of the operator after the injection procedure. Conclusion: This study illustrated the preparedness of the preclinical students for their first local anesthetic injections on humans and suggests for the required modification in the existing dental curriculum for a better training

Evaluation of student‐to‐student local anaesthesia administration at the University of Barcelona: A cross‐sectional study

“…According to the Cugati et al and Meechan studies, women were more anxious about receiving a LA injection than the male participants. These data do not coincide with our study in which no differences between male and female were found.…”

“…Though anaesthesia recipients reported the injection of anaesthesia to be painless, the insertion of the needle was more painful for the men. For Cugati et al and Chandrasekaran et al, mixed responses about this topic were obtained. This variability of data depends on many factors, like the relationship between surgeons and recipients, the contact bone during IANB or the rate at which the anaesthesia flowed amongst others.…”

“…All participants had to fill out a validated questionnaire with three different sections adapted to Cugati et al (). The first part was used to measure the students' anxiety levels before, during and after administering the anaesthetic using the “Interval Scale of Anxiety Response” (ISAR) .…”