Abstract:

Introduction and Purpose: The aim of this study is to identify the perspective of the students of the Faculty of Dentistry on rubber-dam use, to investigate the reasons why they prefer or don’t, and the effects of COVID-19 pandemic. 944 Dentistry Faculty in various cities of Turkey sent the fourth and fifth class students through e-mail and the internet a survey consisting of 22 questions. Only participants who completed the survey were included in the study. In addition to the explicative statistics, the ki-core test was used in the comparison of methods. The results were evaluated at the level of meaning (P <0.05). The survey was completed by 545 students, including 370 (67.9%) women and 175 (32.1%) men. 25.1% of participants said they had never used rubber-dam before, and 41.8% said they did not receive a satisfactory training on rubber-dam use. In each patient with endodontic treatment, the share of participants using rubber-dam is 34.5%. 87% of participants said that rubber-dam made it easier to access the root channels, but 88.8% said that rubber-dam made it more difficult to take radiographs. 69.2% of students thought rubber-dumb could reduce the risk of infection, and 68.6% saw an increase in the desire to use rubber-dumb. RELATED AND RESULTATED: Identifying the current views of students about the use of rubber-dam can be useful in directing the educational content. In the fight against all other infectious diseases, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, it is important to enhance the students’ rubber-dam knowledge and competence.

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