ABSTRACT
Background@#The objective of this study is to investigate the needs and importance of basic core competencies required for future society by dental hygienists’ viewpoints who are working in the clinical practices and to provide the fundamental data to develop the educational programs based on the competencies in the 21st century so as to enhance their working capability. @*Methods@#A total of 38 questionnaires were used in this study, 3 questionnaires on the general characteristics (age, service years, main job functions) and those in 11 sub-factors of basic core competencies including 4 questionnaires on creativity, 3 on collaboration, 3 on communication, 3 on interpersonal relationship, 3 on problem-solving, 4 on resource control, 4 on selfcontrol and development, 2 on vocational ethics, 3 on knowledge information utilization, 3 on global mind, and 3 on emotional intelligence. Self-reported survey was conducted in the dental hygienists who were working in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province and a total of 195 data were analyzed. @*Results@#Vocational ethics, communication, and collaboration showed the highest on both importance and needs with 4.49 points and 4.34; 4.41 and 4.28; and 4.39 and 4.22, respectively, while global mind showed the lowest with 3.51 and 3.59. Upon Importance-Performance Analysis, 7 items were defined to require maintain the status including vocational ethics, communication, collaboration, interpersonal relationship, self-control, emotional intelligence, and problem-solving while 4 items with lower priority were resource control and development, knowledge information utilization, creativity, and global mind. @*Conclusion@#Based on this study results that suggested the basic core competencies of dental hygienists in alignment with their jobs in the future society, competitive dental hygienists should be developed with the educational programs applied with these competencies.
ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: This study examined the work-related musculoskeletal pain and quality of life of hospital workers.METHODS: Self-reported questionnaires were sent to 350 hospital workers at Seoul and Gyeonggi-do, of which 341 were returned. The questionnaire had four items that covered the demographic information, areas of musculoskeletal problems, pain rating scale, and quality of life. The analysis was completed using descriptive statistic, and the differences between pain and demographic variables were identified using a chi-square test. The differences between the type of occupation and quality of life were analyzed by one-way analysis of variance and a Kruskal-Wallis test.RESULTS: The 12-month prevalence of work-related musculoskeletal pain was 86.1% of physical therapists, 86.5% of occupational therapists, 77.1% of dental hygienists, and 75.8% of nurses. A significant difference in the general and work related variables was observed between the subject with a physical burden and type of occupation. The most affected pain sites of the physical therapist included low back, hand and wrist, shoulder, and neck. The occupational therapists included the hand and wrist, shoulder, neck, but the nurses and dental hygienists reported the shoulder, back, hand and wrist. A significant difference in the quality of life was noted between the subjects in physical therapists and dental hygienists and the subjects in the nurses and occupational therapists (p=0.00).CONCLUSION: These findings show that hospital workers appear to be high risk for work-related musculoskeletal pain, and the quality of life of physical therapists and nurses was higher than that of dental hygienists and occupational therapists.