Systematic review of hearing loss in dental professionals.

BACKGROUND: Hearing loss leads to increased irritability and disengagement in social activities and conversations, which may impact quality of life. Dental professionals are at risk of developing hearing loss through daily exposure to noise from a wide range of equipment that produces significantly high decibels and noise frequencies. AIMS: The aim of this systematic review was to investigate the risk of hearing loss in dental professionals, including dentists, dental specialists, dental hygienists and dental assistants. METHODS: This review was conducted following the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews. PubMed, Scopus, Embase, Cochrane, Science Direct, Google Scholar and ProQuest were searched up to March 2023. Seventeen of 416 studies met the inclusion criteria. Quality assessment was performed according to the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale for cohort and case-control studies, and a modified version of this tool for cross-sectional studies. RESULTS: The majority of included studies (82%) found a positive association with hearing loss for dentists and dental specialists, with years of clinical experience identified as a prominent risk factor. Dental hygienists and dental assistants were less commonly reported in the literature. Difference between the left and right ears was found in 71% of studies, with the left ear more affected in both dentists and dental assistants due to proximity to the noise-inducing equipment. CONCLUSIONS: Dental professionals are at risk of hearing loss in their workplace, especially linked to years of clinical experience, which highlights the need for prevention and appropriate ear-protective devices.

The ethics of information disclosure in HIV disease and cancer: a study of medical residents attitudes.

The study analyzes medical residents (MRs) attitudes on the ethics of information disclosure in two case scenarios--HIV disease and cancer. A purposeful sample of 120 MRs took part in a self-completion questionnaire administered. Responses were factor analyzed and three factors (17 statements) protecting rights of (1) spouse/family, (2) patient and (3) society, were retained for study. Analysis revealed that: (1) MRs perceived greater justification (P < 0.0001) in protecting family rights in HIV disease and patient rights (P < 0.0001) in cancer; (2) male MRs were significantly more inclined to protect spouse/family rights (P < 0.01) in HIV disease, when compared to female MRs; and (3) international MRs were significantly more inclined to protect spouse/family (P < 0.05) and societal rights (P < 0.01) in HIV disease, compared with United States MRs. Perception differences by MRs on ethics of information disclosure in HIV disease and cancer are based on MRs gender and their cultural background. It is important to document and address these attitudes during residency training.

Marketing health care to employees: the structure of employee health care plan satisfaction.

Providing cost-contained comprehensive quality health care to maintain healthy and productive employees is a challenging problem for all employers. Using a representative panel of metropolitan employees, the author investigates the internal and external structure of employee satisfaction with company-sponsored health care plans. Employee satisfaction is differentiated into four meaningful groups of health care benefits, whereas its external structure is supported by the traditional satisfaction paradigms of expectation-disconfirmation, attribution, and equity. Despite negative disconfirmation, employees register sufficiently high health care satisfaction levels, which suggests some useful strategies that employers may consider implementing.