Research Article - (2021) Volume 6, Issue 10
Received: 08-Oct-2021
Published:
29-Oct-2021
, DOI: 10.37421/2573-0347.2021.6.229
Citation: Rakshitha VS, Sakthi DS. “Attitude and Perception Towards Risk of Covid-19 Transmission among Parents of Children Visiting Dental Opd in Private Dental Institution’’. Adv Practice Nurs 6 (2021): 229
Copyright: © 2021 Sri Sakthi D. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic started in late 2019 and it is still prevailing. It has become a strain on today's condition. More importantly, it has affected the healthcare utilization behavior of people and it also increased the level of anxiety and stress in parents. When compared to adults children have a healthy respiratory system and an active innate immune system which play an important role. Due to dental treatment nature, procedures produce splatters and aerosols which contain more blood or saliva from patients and carry the risk of high chances of transmission of the virus on a large-scale. Aim: The study aims to evaluate the attitude and perception towards the risk of COVID transmission among parents of children visiting dental OPD in a private dental institution. Materials and Methods: This is a cross-sectional study containing a sample size of 115. A pre-validated questionnaire is prepared and uploaded in Google forms. This standard questionnaire in Google forms has been circulated. At the end of the survey, all the data were collected and tabulated. The frequency and percentage were calculated and the data is being analyzed by using Chi-square analysis. The Chi-square analysis was done by using the IBM SPSS software version 23. Results: The findings indicate that (90.29%) of parents of children visiting dental OPD would take their child to the dental department if their child had a toothache and (89.14%) of parents reported that the various measures are taken in the dental department give them confidence. (22.33%) of parents aged 40-49 reported that the various measures are taken in the dental department give them confidence which is higher compared to the parents aged 30-39 (18.45%). Chi-square analysis was done and the association was found to be statistically significant, p-value: 0.015(p<0.05). Hence statistically significant. Conclusion: In summary, the attitude and perception of parents about COVID-19 in children are good and in further studies, some measures can be taken to treat the emergency treatment patient with low risk.
COVID-19 • Attitude • Perception • Dental treatment • Innovative analysis
The new fatal disease called Coronavirus (COVID-19) spread from Wuhan, China, and Southeast Asia in late 2019, and then it was found to spread almost all over the world [1,2]. According to reports by an authoritative organization in China, 1,393,797 people were affected by COVID-19 globally [3]. The WHO announced that the outbreak of COVID-19 had become an international concern by January 31, 2020(3), and later it was categorized as a pandemic in March [4]. All the patients with severe COVID-19 were suffering from pneumonia [5].
Recent reports for disease control and prevention from the Chinese Centre indicate that children were rarely attacked by COVID-19 [6,7] and Children having higher resistance to infectious disease are still unclear. When compared to adults, children have a healthy respiratory system and an active innate immune system which play an important role [8,9]. The other explanations for having a lesser amount of infection to COVID-19 in children may be due to lesser international travel and also due to minimal participation in outdoor activities which have lower chances of catching the virus [9,10]. A lesser number of pediatric patients at the pandemic start doesn’t mean that children have a lesser chance of the disease, In the future, there can be an increase in the number of pediatric patients [9]. The infectious agent of COVID-19 is identified as 2019-nCoV. The detected method to COVID-19 is confirmed by the existence of 2019-nCoV in bodily fluids, saliva, and feces. The virus spread especially through respiratory droplets by the close contact between people [9]. The important measures taken were protecting the patients with chronic disease, low immunity, and also protecting the older people to avoid rapid virus propagation, social isolation measures were taken [9,11]. Due to dental treatment nature, procedures produce splatters and aerosols which contain more blood or saliva from patients which carry the risk of high chances of transmission of the virus [12]. Therefore, many health departments suggested dental departments follow strict measures like providing only emergency treatment, aerosol operation restriction, and screening patients. However, some reports say that carriers do not have any symptoms [13]. Our team has extensive knowledge and research experience that has translate into high quality publications [14-33]. To add on to the list, a study with significance to the current issue was done to evaluate the attitude and perception of COVID-19 transmission among patients of children visiting dental OPD in private dental institutions.
Study design
A cross-sectional questionnaire survey
Study setting
OPD Department in a private dental institution in Chennai
Sample size
115 outpatients attending the OPD department
Sampling and scheduling
Owing to the nature of the study design and setting, a convenience sampling method was used. And the data was collected over one month.
Survey instrument
A pretested and validated questionnaire was used to measure the baseline of Attitude and Perception towards the risk of COVID-19 transmission among parents of children visiting dental OPD in a private dental institution.
Inclusion and exclusion criteria
All those who were willing to participate were included in the study. Those who were not willing and those who had a language barrier in answering the English version of the questionnaire were excluded from the study
Ethical clearance
Before the start of the study, ethical clearance was obtained from the institutional ethical committee of Saveetha university
Statistical analysis
The responses from the google sheet was transferred into excel and were then exported to SPSS software, version 25. Descriptive statistics were done using frequency and percentage. Inferential statistics were done using the Chisquare test. The interpretation was based on a p-value less than 0.05, which was considered statistically significant. Comparisons were done between independent variables like age, gender, occupation and knowledge, attitude practice responses by the participants.
A cross-sectional questionnaire study containing a sample size of 115. Among 115 sample sizes, the study population contains 43.69% male participants and 56.31% female participants in our study 68.67% of parents of children visiting dental OPD paid attention to the COVID-19 and 66.99% of parents explained COVID-19 to their children often. 28.16% of parents thought the dental department is more dangerous than that of other public places and even 21.36% of parents thought that the dental department could cause their child to become infected by a virus. 90.29% of parents of children visiting dental OPD reported that they would take their child to dental OPD if their child had a toothache. At the same time, 9.71% of parents said that they would not take their child to dental OPD even if their child had a severe toothache. 89.14% of parents reported that the various measures are taken in the dental department give them confidence. 22.33% aged 40-49 years reported that they had gained confidence from the various measures taken by the dental department. In our study, we observed that 21.21% of females paid more attention to COVID-19 than males 11.11%. The Chi-square analysis was done and the association was found to be statistically not significant, p-value: 0.113(p>0.05). 22.33% of females don't think the dental department is more dangerous than that of other public places than males 15.53%. The Chi-square analysis was done and the association was found to be statistically not significant, p-value: 0.911(p>0.05). 49.51% of females said that they would take their child to dental OPD if their child had a toothache than male 40.78%. The Chisquare analysis was done and the association was found to be statistically not significant, p-value: 0.358(p>0.05). 22.33% of parents aged 40-49 reported that the various measures taken in the dental department give them confidence and 18.45% of parents aged 30-39 gained confidence by the various measures taken in the dental department. The Chi-square analysis was done and the association was found to be statistically significant, p-value:0.015(p<0.05) (Figure 1-4).
Figure 1. Pie chart showing the percentage of parents according to how often they explain the pandemic to their child. wherein, green color represents always (36.89%), the blue color represents yes (30.10%), beige color represents occasionally (30.10%) and violet represents never (2.91%).
Figure 2. Pie chart showing the percentage distribution about considering dental treatment could cause their child to become infected by a virus. wherein, green color represents no (37.86%), beige color represents a risk in other places (33.98%) and blue color represents yes (28.16%).
Figure 3. Bar graph showing an association between gender and frequency of attention to COVID-19. The X-axis represents the gender and the Y-axis represents the percentage of participants who paid attention to COVID-19. (17.17%) reported always and (21.21%) reported yes. Blue denotes yes, green denotes always and beige denotes occasionally. We observed that (21.21%) of females paid more attention to COVID-19 than males (11.11%). Chi-square analysis was done and the association was found to be statistically not significant, p-value: 0.113(p>0.05). Hence statistically not significant.
Figure 4. Bar graph showing an association between age and frequency of various measures taken in the dental department. The X-axis represents age and Y-axis represents the percentage of participants who gained confidence by the various measures taken in the dental department. (7.77%) aged 20-29 reported maybe, (28.16%) aged 30-39 reported maybe, (22.33%) aged 40-49 reported yes, and (0.97%) aged over 50 reported yes. Blue denotes yes, green denotes no and beige denotes maybe. (22.33%) of parents aged 40-49 reported that the various measures are taken in the dental department give them confidence which is higher compared to the parents aged 30-39(18.45%). Chi-square analysis was done and the association was found to be statistically significant, p-value: 0.015(p<05). Hence statistically significant.
In our study, parents explained COVID-19 to their children was 68.7% which is higher compared to Jin Sun et al where 45.95% of parents explained COVID-19 to their child because of spending more time with their children and talking about COVID-19 [11]. 21.7% of parents believe that their child might be infected during dental treatment which is lesser compared to Sawsan Abuhammad where 61% of parents believe that their child might be infected due to high confidence in the prevention and control policies of government and hospitals [34].
89.5% of parents take their child to the dental department if they had a severe toothache which is higher compared to Yan Xu et al study where 83.78% of parents take their child to the dental department because of preventive measures taken in the dental department like strengthening the environment of the hospital by disinfecting, providing special protective equipment for both patients and dentist [11]. 71.9% of parents paid attention to COVID-19 which is lesser compared to Yan Xu et al which is 94.59% because of busy periods of life and work. 27% of parents think the dental department is more dangerous than other public places which are less compared to Jin Sun et al which is 66.22%.
According to Jin Sun et al study, parents aged 40-49 years or above 50 years explained COVID-19 to their children was significantly higher when compared to parents aged 30-39 years. In our study, 28.16% of parents of children visiting dental OPD thought that the dental department is more dangerous than other public places which are lesser compared to Yan Xu et al study where more than two-thirds of parents of children thought that the dental department is dangerous. Among them, parents aged 40-49 years thought the environment of the dental department was more dangerous and it was significantly higher when compared to the parents aged 20-29 years.
In our study, only a short period of data collection was used and the number of questions in the questionnaire was limited. Lack of dental staff and limitations in treatment projects were found. There will be possibilities of bias because some responders don't have access to the internet to participate in the online survey. Finally, the online survey is limited. Further studies involve more efforts in informing the public to avoid contamination in the dental offices.
Even though parents were worried about COVID-19, a considerable percentage of parents of children would take their child to dental OPD, if their child had a toothache and 94.8% of parents reported that the various protective measures taken in the dental department gives them more confidence in the dental treatment and also some measures can be taken in further studies to treat the urgent cases with low risk.
Rakshitha VS-Study design, Data collection, Data analysis, Manuscript writing.
Sri Sakthi D-Study concept, Data verification, Data analysis, Manuscript drafting, and correction.
We thank all the participants and Saveetha Dental College for their support to conduct this study.
The authors reported the conflict of interest while performing this study to be nil.
The present project is supported/funded/sponsored by Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences Saveetha Dental College and Hospitals Saveetha University.
Kalpana Indane Gas Agency.
Journal of Advanced Practices in Nursing received 410 citations as per Google Scholar report
