Defensive Dentistry Practices and Dentists (DDP)

An Analysis of Clinicians' Knowledge and Attitudes Regarding Defensive Dentistry Practices: A Survey-based Research

Medical malpractice claims have been on the rise in recent years due to the growing patient rights movement. This term is defined as an injury caused by a healthcare professional's failure to follow standard practice during treatment, a lack of skill, or failure to provide treatment. Defensive dentistry is on the rise as violence and malpractice claims increase. Defensive dental practices (DDP) refer to minimize legal responsibility of the clinician primarily rather than looking out for the patient's benefit. This study aims to evaluate the knowledge, awareness and attitudes of dentists in terms of DDP.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Defensive Medicine
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: Survey-based Data Collection Tool

• Study Type: Observational
• Enrollment (Actual): 410

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Turkey
  • Kucukcekmece
    • Istanbul, Kucukcekmece, Turkey, 34295
      • Istanbul Aydin University

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

• Sampling Method: Non-Probability Sample

Study Population

All participants are the volunteered dentists registered as a member of Turkish Dental Association

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Having worked as a dentist for at least one year;
• Speaking Turkish as their native language;
• Being a member of the Turkish Dental Association;
• Participating in the study voluntarily.

Exclusion Criteria:

-To stop volunteering until the study is completed.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Number of groups / cohorts

1

Cohorts and Interventions

Group / Cohort

Intervention / Treatment

All participants

Other: Survey-based Data Collection Tool; The data collection tool to be presented to the participants is planned as a three-part survey. The first part of this form asked 9 questions about the demographic characteristics of the participants consisted of age, gender, marital status, duration in the profession, specialization in dentistry, type of workplace, and off-the-clock work. The second part of the data collection tool consisted of the 'Defensive Dentistry Practice Survey,'(DDPS) DDPS which is the original language of which is Turkish, is a 5-point Likert-type scale. A total of 12 statements about DDPS which measure the opinions, attitudes, or behaviors of the participants in terms of DDP, the following options are used: strongly disagreed, disagreed, neither disagreed nor agreed, agreed and strongly agreed, each expressing groups of 20%. The last part of the survey had 3 close-ended questions with yes-no options expressing 50% groups is used.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
DDPS Score	Total DDPS score of a participant is determined by assigning points as "completely disagreed" (1 point), "disagreed" (2 points), "neither disagreed nor agreed" (3 points), "agreed" (4 points), "completely agreed" (5 points). The total scores are categorized considering the cut-off values as very poor (23-12), poor (35-24), good (47-36), very good (60-48) to determine the level of participants' attitudes towards DDP.	1hour

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Istanbul Aydın University

Publications and helpful links

General Publications

• Baungaard N, Skovvang PL, Assing Hvidt E, Gerbild H, Kirstine Andersen M, Lykkegaard J. How defensive medicine is defined in European medical literature: a systematic review. BMJ Open. 2022 Jan 20;12(1):e057169. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2021-057169.
• Raposo VL. Defensive Medicine and the Imposition of a More Demanding Standard of Care. J Leg Med. 2019 Oct-Dec;39(4):401-416. doi: 10.1080/01947648.2019.1677273.

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): January 1, 2022
• Primary Completion (Actual): July 30, 2022
• Study Completion (Actual): July 30, 2023

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: July 8, 2024
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: July 8, 2024
• First Posted (Actual): July 15, 2024

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): July 15, 2024
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: July 8, 2024
• Last Verified: July 1, 2024

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Other Study ID Numbers: IAUDENT-02

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: UNDECIDED

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No