Perceived Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Orthodontic Practice in the Middle East

Abstract

Background: With COVID-19 announced as a global pandemic, a countrywide lockdown was executed in many countries, including the Middle East. With no foregoing warning or expectation, orthodontic treatments were temporarily canceled as dental clinics and colleges were indefinitely closed. To the best of our knowledge, no study addresses the orthodontist perspective in such testing times, where they are entirely restricted to the confines of their homes. The study aims to assess the impact of the COVID-19-related lockdown on orthodontists and orthodontic postgraduate students' treatment and psychology. Materials and Methods: The survey participants consist of 315 orthodontists and orthodontic postgraduate residents from different Middle East countries. A pretested self-administered questionnaire was sent to the consenting participants through an online data collection platform (Google forms), covering participants' sociodemographics and participants' perceived impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results: A majority of the participants (87.61%) stated that the pandemic would permanently change their way of practicing orthodontics and also will lead to the reduction in the number of orthodontic patients in the future (78.73%), and a significant number of orthodontists (67.61%) has an opinion that the pandemic will not affect the viability of their profession. The majority of the respondents (88.57%) commented about the negative economic impact of COVID-19 on their income, and regarding the effect of COVID-19 on psychosocial well-being, 73.01% had experienced anxiety and depression, 88.25% were excited about the future of the profession, and 68.57% enjoyed the life with their family due to lockdown, and when asked about their social life with the family and friends, majority of the participants (66.34%) had an opinion that it has improved due to the increased free time. Conclusions: Most of the respondents reported perceived economic, psychosocial, and social impacts due to the pandemic.

The impact of COVID-19 pandemic on orthodontic services and trainees’ mental health in India

“…A recent survey by the American Association of Orthodontists showed similar results, but they reported that 93% of orthodontists managing financial aspects received government/public funded support during the COVID-19 pandemic ( 11 ). Across the globe, revenue generation from orthodontic clinics fell during the COVID-19 pandemic due to a reduction in patient throughput, despite providers increasing their hours to provide improved treatment capacity and to try and compensate for the impacts of the pandemic to a limited extent ( 4 , 12 , 13 ). Cross infection measures, social distancing, Cancellations due to testing positive and the need for self-isolation, increased fail-to-attend rates, fallow times, and the time taken for increased cross-infection measures between patients all had a negative effect on productivity within the clinical environment.…”