A cross-sectional survey of attention and knowledge level among dental students in Jiangxi province during the epidemic period of COVID-19

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: To investigate the level of attention and knowledge level of dental students in Jiangxi province during the epidemic period of COVID-19, and provide data support for optimizing the training program of dental professionals in the future. METHODS: Two thousand and sixty-five valid questionnaires were collected from stomatological colleges in Jiangxi province through internet. SPSS 20.0 software was used for statistical analysis, Chi-square test and binary logistic regression were used for single factor and multi factor analysis. RESULTS: According to the survey, 74.72% of dental students expressed their concern about the epidemic situation, and 75.93% expressed that they checked the number of confirmed cases in China once or more every day. Students with higher education background, licensed doctor certificate and better family status paid more attention to the epidemic period and frequently checked the information(P<0.05). The categories of information most concerned by all respondents was data such as the number of newly diagnosed patients and the number of cured cases, followed by the diagnosis and treatment of patients with COVID-19.The average score of knowledge about epidemic situation was 5.60±1.88. Analysis of influencing factors showed that the knowledge level of women was higher than that of men（OR=1.371，95%CI1.143-1.644）.Medical students from Hubei province had a good level of knowledge, high education, party members, and students with medical qualifications had a high level of knowledge about epidemic situation of COVID-19(P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The epidemic period of COVID-19 is a high concern among dental students in Jiangxi province , and the awareness rate of related knowledge is low. In order to improve the quality of dental personnel training, the medical colleges or school should strengthen the training of students' operations in the hospital, and add relevant courses of public health emergency in the training program.