Investigation of the Awareness of the Students of Shiraz Dental School Concerning the Patients’ Rights and the Principles of Ethics in Dentistry

STATEMENT OF PROBLEM Deliberating the patients' rights is one of the major human ethical and legal principles which can be investigated through the agenda of professional and medical ethics.accordingly , the students of dentistry have to be educated about this issue and achieve the necessary skills in deliberating and concerning the patients' rights. PURPOSE The present study aimed to investigate Shiraz dental students' awareness and attitude regarding the patients' rights as well as the principles of dental ethics in order to design methods for organizing and improving the ethics in dentistry. MATERIALS AND METHOD The present descriptive-analytical study was conducted on 111 students of different departments of Shiraz Dental School. The study data were collected through a questionnaire designed based on the patients' rights charter in Iran, ADA ethical codes which are internationally acceptable in the field of dentistry, and the guidelines of the ministry of health, treatment, and medical education (No. 140588). Then, the data were entered into the SPSS statistical software and analyzed. RESULTS Of all participants, 21.6% were men and 78.4% were women. According to the results, 71% of the students were acquainted with the patients' rights. In addition, the patients' characteristics, including gender and nationality, were not important for 58.6% of the students. CONCLUSION The study findings showed that 71% of the participants were acquainted with the patients' rights Establishment of a comprehensive, integrated charter in Iran is needed. With rapid development of medical sciences, new issues appear which necessitate taking into account the mutual rights of the physicians, people, and patients.