IADR Abstract Archives
Social Justice Education in Dentistry
Objectives: There has recently been an increase in awareness of the importance of social conduct among health care students and professionals. Social justice, empathy and social responsibility are thus emerging themes in dental education. While many dental schools have begun incorporating these concepts into their curriculum, our knowledge of these initiatives and their effectiveness is limited. The objective of this study is therefore to understand how dental students and faculty perceive social justice education in the undergraduate dentistry curriculum.
Methods: We are conducting semi-structured interviews with dental students and faculty at the University of Montreal using a purposive sampling method until saturation. Participants’ answers will be transcribed and coded using QDA Miner 5.0 (Provalis 2016). We will then analyze the data to discover emerging themes using qualitative research methods.
Results: We anticipate that the interviews will elucidate the value placed on empathy and social competency by students and educators. We hope to gain insight on their perspectives and needs to better incorporate the teaching of social justice in the dental school curriculum to train socially competent dentists focused on patient-centered care to better serve the community.
Conclusions: We hope that the results of this study will help provide information for developers of dental school curricula. We also plan on creating a questionnaire for a quantitative phase to the study as one does not currently exist. We hope that this tool will be useful to other health care faculties as well.
Methods: We are conducting semi-structured interviews with dental students and faculty at the University of Montreal using a purposive sampling method until saturation. Participants’ answers will be transcribed and coded using QDA Miner 5.0 (Provalis 2016). We will then analyze the data to discover emerging themes using qualitative research methods.
Results: We anticipate that the interviews will elucidate the value placed on empathy and social competency by students and educators. We hope to gain insight on their perspectives and needs to better incorporate the teaching of social justice in the dental school curriculum to train socially competent dentists focused on patient-centered care to better serve the community.
Conclusions: We hope that the results of this study will help provide information for developers of dental school curricula. We also plan on creating a questionnaire for a quantitative phase to the study as one does not currently exist. We hope that this tool will be useful to other health care faculties as well.
