Search

Background: Children with disabilities generally face poorer oral health outcomes compared with their non‐disabled peers due to a range of factors including inadequate oral hygiene, infrequent dental visits and systemic barriers in accessing care. Aim: This ethnographic study explored the perspectives of caregivers and professionals to identify the ways that children with disabilities are included in oral health. Design: A purposive sample of 10 caregivers, all mothers with disabled children aged 9–15 years, five healthcare providers and five educators in Saudi Arabia, participated. Data collection used participant observation and semi‐structured in‐depth interviews. Data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. Results: The findings suggest that mothers lacked a supportive environment to develop their skills and knowledge about oral health care, preventing them from including their children in oral health. Inaccessible services added to the exclusion of both mothers and children. Some dental professionals exhibited poor communication skills and discriminatory attitudes towards the children and problematising mothers. Educators tended to discuss disabled children in terms of inability, displaying a deficit approach to impairment. Conclusions: The evidence suggests the exclusion of mothers from oral health. This has an impact on how they enable their children. Recommendations include adopting a social model of disability in dental education and policies in Saudi Arabia to address inequalities. Provision of support, education and focusing on societal barriers moves towards inclusion rather than conceptualising disability as an individual problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: For dental graduates, internships are a vital transitional phase that gives them the invaluable opportunity to close the gap between their academic studies and the reality of professional dentistry. Research on dental internships remains limited and most of the existing studies focus on the clinical aspects of dental internships with little attention given to dental interns' experiences overall. This study aims to bridge this gap in the literature by gaining an in-depth understanding of Saudi dental graduates' range of experiences as dental interns. Methods: To achieve the research objective, this study adopted a qualitative approach. Using purposive and snowball sampling, the study recruited 23 dental interns from Riyadh Province, Saudi Arabia, who had completed at least nine months of their internship. Data was gathered across three months via diaries and virtual semi-structured interviews based on participants' preferences. The data was then analysed thematically using an inductive analytical strategy. Results: The data analysis revealed three major themes and four sub-themes regarding the experiences of dental interns. The core three themes were "activities", "autonomy" and "transitioning to a balanced life" whereby interns have the time and freedom to explore their interests, rekindle their social lives and focus on self-care, resulting in a better work-life balance. Conclusion: This study suggests that dental interns will benefit from the retention and strengthening of key internship activities such as research, community work and clinical rotations. Additionally, the experiences of dental interns can be improved by encouraging interns to progress in their clinical training with a high level of autonomy. Also, due to the limited research in this area, further studies are required to improve our understanding of the lived experiences of dental interns and dental internships in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: This study aimed to assess the knowledge of monkeypox infection among dental hygiene professionals and students in Saudi Arabia. Methods: A cross‐sectional study was conducted among a convenience sample of dental hygiene professionals (n = 259). The questionnaire was developed based on previous literature, and descriptive analysis and a Chi‐square test were performed. Results: A total of 159 dental hygienists responded to the questionnaire. Results indicated that only 1.7% had good knowledge, 7.7% had moderate knowledge and 90.6% had low knowledge of the monkeypox outbreak. The mean knowledge scores varied among dental hygiene students, practitioners and faculty members. Significant group differences were observed for some questions (p < 0.05). Conclusion: Our study concludes that dental hygienists had moderate to low level of knowledge of the monkeypox infection and its implications for oral health and patient care, indicating a need for more education on the subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Soft drink consumption is continuing to grow worldwide, posing an increasing threat to people's health and general wellbeing. Consequently, we must understand the factors driving soft drink consumption to support improvements to nutrition. This paper adopts a qualitative research approach to explore individuals' perceptions of the factors linked to daily soft drink consumption among university students in Saudi Arabia., Materials and Methods: This research employed purposive sampling to recruit a total of 19 students attending university in Al Madinah Province, Saudi Arabia, all of whom reported that they had previously consumed soft drinks. Over 3 months, data was gathered through a mixture of online and in-person semi-structured interviews. Once completed, the interviews were then transcribed and analyzed using inductive thematic analysis to identify the themes that emerged from the data., Results: This study reveals five core themes: taste, habit, price, environment and social context, and health concerns. Regarding health concerns, this study finds that the public's increasing concerns about health can reduce people's consumption of soft drinks. Significantly, this research reveals that the rise in health concerns among the public is being driven by the growing conversation about healthy food and the negative impact of consuming sugary soft drinks occurring in wider society., Conclusion: To conclude, this research underlines the value of adopting a holistic approach to promoting healthier drink choices (and thus reducing soft drink consumption). Interventions that focus on factors associated with soft drink consumption, such as habits, price, environment, social settings, health concerns, and taste, will be better able to decrease soft drink consumption and improve people's nutritional intake., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Sarhan, Aljohani, Alnazzawi, Alharbi, Alotaibi, Alhujaili and Alwadi.)