Thai dentists' gender differences in time spent on practicing dentistry

Objective: This study aims to compare the time male and female dentists in Thailand spend on their dental practices. Methods: The time spent on specific dental tasks was measured using a self-administered questionnaire. Seven hundred and fifty dentists who held an active dental license in the year 2010 were randomly selected. The questionnaire was mailed to those selected dentists. Descriptive statistics were used to analyse the data, with p < 0.05 as the level of significance. Results: Two hundred and ninety six dentists (39.5%) responded the questionnaire. The age range was 24 to 64 years (mean 34.7 + 7.7). The mean time spent per treatment varied from 13.46 + 7.4 to 176.3 + 117.4 minutes depended on the types of dental work. Total absent from work days of male and female dentists are 25.67 + 24.35 and 26.84 + 30.46 consecutively. No statistical significance was found either in the time used per treatment or days absent from work, except for child delivery/maternity leave. Conclusion: Gender difference on dental productivity is not vividly demonstrated from this study