Conceptions of dentists and dental nurses about ergonomics

Abstract

Sixty-eight dentists and 90 dental nurses, all working in a municipal dental care programme in the city of Helsinki, Finland, were surveyed by a questionnaire about their knowledge of and attitudes towards ergonomics. Thirty-three per cent of the dentists and 36% of the dental nurses were of the opinion that they were at present working according to ergonomic principles. Fifty-one per cent of the dentists and 45% of the nurses could not indicate any ergonomic problem in their place of work. Of the remainder the dental unit was mentioned by 62% of the dentists, and own or counterpart's working posture and habits by 44% of the nurses as the most frequent ergonomic problem. Training in dental ergonomics during undergraduate studies was significantly more general among the nurses than the dentists. Ergonomic knowledge and attitudes were found to correlate with each other, as well as knowledge of ergonomics with training in ergonomics and ergonomic working style, but only among the nurses. The results indicate that a dental team needs functionally-designed dental equipment and instruction in ergonomic principles applied to dentistry.

Key words:

• Dentist
• Dental nurses
• Dental ergonomics
• Questionnaires