Treatment Patterns of Deep Occlusal Caries among Dentists in Saudi Arabia

Author(s):

Samar Hatem Abuzinadah*, Mohammed Qarni, Baraah Zulali, Hatoon Abumelha, Shatha Abumelha, Wejdan Fallatah, Buthaynah Alqashami, Atheer Almourey, Ghaida Alqahtani and Khames T Alzahrani

Introduction: Dental caries is a multifactorial microbial infectious disease that causes demineralization of the inorganic and destruction of the organic tooth material. There are different options for dentists when they have to deal with deep occlusal caries. There are no data focused on managing Deep Occlusal Caries (DCLs) on mildly inflamed teeth and pulp are healthy enough to be rescued in Saudi Arabia. Thus, it is also unknown if dentists practice minimally invasive protocols to remove decayed tissue in their usual clinical procedures. Methods: It’s cross-sectional observational research with a high degree of confidence based on web-survey questions created by the author. The sample size was 479 estimated using the qualtrics calculator with a confidence level of 95% and a margin of error of 5%. The questionnaire is divided into four categories. We started the questioner with demographic factors including age, nationality, dental degree date, country, work setting, and cariology course attendance. Second, it was about three clinical scenarios. Google forms were used to gather data, and microsoft excel was used to prepare the data for analysis. Statistical analysis was performed using the SPSS software. Results: A total of 479 participants responded, dental students and interns, students (N=220, 41.8% ), dental interns (N=121, 25.3%), general practitioner (N=128, 26.7%) and specialists (N=30, 6.3%). Participants was predominantly males ( N=263, 54.9% ) while females (N=216, 45.1%). Concerning the nationality Saudi-Arabian participants (N=456, 95.2%) and non-Saudi-Arabian (N=23, 4.8%). 66.2% had attend and undergo educational courses in the cardiology field in the last 5 years. Most of the respondents worked in private practice (N=75, 26.9%). Conclusion: Dentists still had no consented treatment approach for deep caries lesion teeth. The most chosen therapy in the case of deep caries lesion with reversible pulpitis is total caries excavation.