Volume 25, Issue 115, September 2021

Knowledge, attitude, and diagnostic ability of oral cancer among dental students in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Fahad Amer Almutairi¹, Abdulelah Abdulrahman Alanazi¹, Moath Mansour Almansour¹, Ibraheem Mansour Almansour², Saleem Faiz Shaikh³, Hisham Al Rashaid⁴, Baseer MA^5♦

¹General Dental Practitioner, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia ²Dental Intern, College of Dentistry, Majmaah University, Majmaah, Saudi Arabia
³Department of Maxillofacial Surgery and Diagnostic Sciences, College of Dentistry, Majmaah University, Majmaah, Saudi Arabia
⁴Resident, Saudi Board of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Faculty of Dentistry, King Abdul Aziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
⁵Department of Preventive Dentistry, College of Dentistry, Riyadh Elm University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

^♦Corresponding author
Department of Preventive Dentistry, College of Dentistry, Riyadh Elm University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

ABSTRACT

Aim: To assess the awareness, knowledge, attitude, and diagnostic ability of oral cancer and its early signs and risk factors among undergraduate dental students in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Material and method: In this cross-sectional study a total of 468 participants responded to a close-ended online questionnaire consisting of 24 pre-tested items on oral examination, risk factors of oral malignancies, and their attitude towards the oral cancer approach. The relationship between the questionnaire items and characteristics of the study participants (academic year and gender) was assessed using the Chi-square and Kruskal-Wallis tests. Results: A high percentage of fifth-year students identified tobacco (30%) and alcohol usage (30.9%), viral infections (30.7%), UV exposure (32.5%), older age (33.5%), poor-fitting denture (31.1%), consumption of spicy foods (37.7%) and low consumption of fruit and vegetables (29.4%) as the risk factors for oral cancer. The knowledge of risk factors of oral cancer was noticed between the 2nd year and 4th year, 2nd year and 5th year dental students did not differ significantly. Similarly, the knowledge of the diagnostic ability between 4th and fifth years students did not differ significantly. In general, the fifth-year students had a higher percentage of correct responses to the items. Conclusion: Dental students lacked sufficient knowledge of diagnostic ability in detecting oral cancer. Hence it is necessary to focus on providing knowledge in diagnosing oral cancer patients within the dental schools of Riyadh. Thus, it will help dental students in the proper screening and early diagnosis of oral cancerous lesions.

Keywords: Oral cancer, awareness, dental students, attitude, diagnostic ability

Medical Science, 2021, 25(115), 2364-2372

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