Knowledge and attitude of dental students towards in‌fection control in Babol dental school

Introduction: Regarding the cross contamina-tion, prevention from infection is of high prior‌ity. The aim of this research was assessment of knowledge and attitude of dental students toward infection control in endodontics depart‌ment of faculty of dentistry, Babol Uni‌versity of medi‌cal sciences.  Materials and Methods: The study was accom‌plished among 8th, 10th and 12th grade dental students in endodontics department during Oc‌tober-January, 2011. The student's knowledge and attitude towards infection control were in‌vestigated. The range of knowledge score was 8 to 19. The scores below 14 were considered low and between14 to 17 moderate and higher than 17 good. The attitude questions also in‌cluded 3 answers (agree, disagree and have no idea). Their scores were -1, 0 and 1. The range of atti‌tude score was -6 to 8. The scores below -2 were con‌sidered low and between -2 to 2 moderate and higher than 2 good. Data were collected via questionnaire and analyzed statisti‌cally using One-Way ANOVA, and HSD Tukey. Results: There was no significant difference between men (15.45±2.85) and women know‌ledge (15.2±2.7) (P=0.65) and attitude (0.2±2.5 vs. 0.35±2.49) (P=0.5). The difference between 8th and 12th semester was statistically significant (p=0.026). There was no significant difference between different semesters in attitude (p=0.94). Conclusion: This study revealed that knowledge and attitude of Babol Dental School toward in‌fection control is not adequate and more training in both educational and practical fields is re‌quired.