Turkish Dental Students' Perceptions and Awareness of Dental Implant Education: A Questionnaire Study

Objective. This study aimed to assess Turkish dental students' awareness of and attitudes toward dental implant therapy, as well as the effectiveness of dental implantology lecture from their point of view. Materials and Methods. This study used a cross-sectional online survey. A total of 425 third-, fourth-and fifth-year dental students enrolled in Gazi University School of Dentistry during the 2020-2021 academic year were invited to participate in the survey anonymously and voluntarily. Following the descriptive part (age, gender, and education status), all the participants were asked 11 questions. Results. Total of 415 questionnaires were analyzed. The 3rd-year students stated that they were "poorly" informed about dental implants (n=88, 64.7%), while the 4th- and 5th-year students were "moderately" infromed (n=78, 54.2% and n=60, 44.4%, respectively) (p < 0.001). All the students were believed that they needed to get more information during their undergraduate studies (p < 0.01). More than half of all students preferred to have PhD or speciality training after graduation (p > 0.05). Approximately 80% of all students believed that dentists should receive specialized training in order to practice implant dentistry (p > 0.05). Conclusions. The results of this study show that some Turkish dental students find DI treatment a difficult operation and that they do not know enough about it. As a result, it is anticipated that improving the current curriculum will contribute to the course success and make dental students feel better prepared for dental implantology following graduation.