Methods: In this descriptive study, 89 dentists who had participated in the recently held dental congress of Iranian Dental Association (IDA) were randomly enrolled. A self-administered questionnaire including personal (age, gender, academic level) and scientific information about pulp capping and SE was individually handed to the participants. The reliability and validity of this questionnaire was previously evaluated. The data were analyzed by statistical tests with significance of 0.05.
Results: 89 participants (41 male, 48 female) ranging from 23 to 62 years old, were enrolled in the research, 20 of which were students, 63 general practitioners and 6 specialists (oral and maxillofacial surgeon, endodontist, prosthodontist, oral pathologist and periodontist). Only 14% of the participants were aware of SE, 28% of whom reported prior application of SE. In case of deep caries occurrence, 39% of participants believed in removing the caries completely even when pulp exposure happened, while 48% preferred to leave some caries behind followed by restoration and sealing the cavity, and finally 15% chose the root canal therapy. Regarding the knowledge rank, only 1.1% (one person) showed a medium awareness of SE, indirect pulp capping (IPC) and direct pulp capping (DPC) and the remaining 98.9% achieved low marks. Also 78% reported applying calcium hydroxide as the most common liner in the pulp capping technique.
Conclusions: According to the results of this study and weak knowledge of dentists about SE, IPC and DPC techniques, it seems crucial to consider continuing education courses in this field.