Knowledge, attitudes, and performance of dental students in relation to sterilization/disinfection methods of extracted human teeth

Background: Dental students use extracted human teeth to learn practical and technical skills before they enter the clinical environment. In the present research, knowledge, performance, and attitudes toward sterilization/disinfection methods of extracted human teeth were evaluated in a selected group of Iranian dental students. Materials and Methods: In this descriptive cross-sectional study the subjects consisted of fourth-, fifth- and sixth-year dental students. Data were collected by questionnaires and analyzed by Fisher’s exact test and Chi-squared test using SPSS 11.5. Results: In this study, 100 dental students participated. The average knowledge score was 15.9 ± 4.8. Based on the opinion of 81 students sodium hypochlorite was selected as suitable material for sterilization and 78 students believed that oven sterilization is a good way for the purpose. The average performance score was 4.1 ± 0.8, with 3.9 ± 1.7 and 4.3 ± 1.1 for males and females, respectively, with no significant differences between the two sexes. The maximum and minimum attitude scores were 60 and 25, with an average score of 53.1 ± 5.2. Conclusion: The results of this study indicated that knowledge, performance and attitude of dental students in relation to sterilization/disinfection methods of extracted human teeth were good. However, weaknesses were observed in relation to teaching and materials suitable for sterilization.