Evaluation of Parental Acceptance of Different Behavior Management Techniques in Pediatric Dentistry, Zahedan, Iran

Background: Parents play an imperative role in building up their child's attitude towards dentistry. Among the several behavior management techniques, some are more accepted by parents; while, some others are condemned. This study aimed to evaluate the parents' acceptance of various behavior management techniques in pediatric dentistry. Materials and Methods: This descriptive-analytical study was conducted on 70 Iranian parents who sought dental treatment for their <12-year-old children. This study was performed in the Department of Pediatric Dentistry of Zahedan Dental School, Iran, in 2017. The parents completed a questionnaire about their child's age, sex, and birth rank, as well as their number of children and parental education. They were explained about the method, advantages and disadvantages of different behavior management techniques. Then, they were asked to rate their acceptance of each approach on a visual analogue scale scoring from 0 (strongly disagree) to 10 (strongly agree). Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney tests were used to analyze the data through SPSS software version 21.0. Results: The tell-show-do technique was the most commonly accepted method among parents (6.3±2.47), followed by the voice control (5.62±1.82), general anesthesia (4.52±2.17), modeling (3.68±1.60), and sedation (3.92±1.13), respectively. The physical restrain (2.47±1.34), and hand-over-mouth (2.14±0.87) were least welcome by parents. Moreover, the parents' mean score of acceptance of different behavior management techniques was significantly based on their child's age; nonetheless, it was not significantly different with respect to their child's sex and birth rank, total number of children in the family, and parental education. Conclusion: Based on the present findings, tell-show-do and hand-over-mouth were respectively the most and the least commonly accepted techniques among the studied Iranian parents.