The Viewpoints of Dentists toward Continuing Dental Education

Introduction: Continuing education can play an important role in improving and keeping dentists’ level of knowledge and skills. Hence, investigation on continuing education program seems to be necessary. This study was performed to assess dentists’ viewpoints about continuing education on oral medicine. Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on 300 dentists participating in 52nd Iranian dental association congress (2012). Data gathering tool was a questionnaire including demographic data, program title priorities for oral medicine (scores from 1-10, the less the mean score, the higher the priority), teaching techniques, performance and quality of programs, and motivation for participation. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics. Results: The first priorities in educational title were taking history (3.62±3.25) and clinical internal and external oral examination (3.52±3.1). Participants preferred attending workshops and performing practical jobs (3.06±2.28) and observing practical jobs (2.99±2.11). Two hundred and seventy five dentists (91.7%) noted that employing skillful professors improves the quality of the program. Most participants specified participating in continuing education programs two times a year. Conclusion: According to participants’ viewpoints, taking history and clinical examination skills were the priorities in educational title. Moreover, practical training and employing skillful professors were among main concerns of dentists. Making use of the findings of this study can lead to dental continuing education programs.