Self-reported anxiety of dental procedures among dental students and its relation to gender and level of education

Objectives The study aimed to identify the dental procedures that elicit the highest level of anxiety by various dental procedures and to determine the correlation of anxiety with students' gender and varying perceptions of anxiety across years of dental education. Methods This cross-sectional study was conducted at Sardar Begum Dental College, Peshawar, Pakistan during June 2014. The Corah's Dental Anxiety Scale (DAS) was distributed to all students. This instrument had 26 items examining the anxiety levels experienced for different dental procedures. Options ranging from 1 to 4 were provided for every item, where 1 represented low anxiety and 4 represented the highest anxiety. Results The overall response rate was 67.3% (n = 101; 64 females and 37 males). Among the top five dental procedures eliciting the highest anxiety levels, females were found to be more anxious than males for all procedures (fear of injection/needle, root canal treatment, extraction, and application of cold air) except the need for further treatment. Pre-clinical students (1st and 2nd year) were found to be more anxious than clinical students (3rd and 4th year). Significant differences (p < 0.05) were found for three procedures: rubber dam placement, inability to stop dentist, and impression taking. Clinical students reported high anxiety for the latter, and pre-clinical students reported higher anxiety for the former two procedures. Conclusions Higher anxiety levels were reported by females and pre-clinical students than their respective counterparts. Educational sessions and graded exposure therapy at an initial stage of dental educational training may decrease the anxiety associated with dental procedures.