AN ASSESSMENT OF DENTISTS' KNOWLEDGE ABOUT MEDICAL EMERGENCIES.

Medical emergency when occurs in a dental environment should be handled efficiently and effectively in order to sustain life until medical help arrives. This study aimed to enhance knowledge amongst dental practitioners about the possible risks of a medical emergency to improve patient care. A questionnaire based study was conducted in the dental teaching hospitals of the twin cities, Rawalpindi and Islamabad in 2015. The questionnaire comprised of three sections to assess dentists' perception and dentists' knowledge on the commonly faced medical emergencies along with dentists' confidence in performing Basic Life Support (BLS). 215 questionnaires were distributed out of which 192 were returned. The study sample included 122 female and 70 male dentists with a minimum clinical experience of one year. The results showed 71.4% received a formal BLS training while 84.4% wanted to receive the training. Moreover, the mean medical emergency score obtained was 5.28 out of a maximum of 10. 55.2% of the dental practitioners felt confident in performing Cardio Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR), out of which, 80.5 % had the correct knowledge of performing a CPR according to this study. The most significant finding was almost half of the dentists lack the knowledge and necessary training. Hence, in order to improve quality of patient care annual BLS courses should be made mandatory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]