Glover Samantha, Divaris Kimon, Stickrath Kylie, Harmon Jennifer, Roberts Michael W
Doctor of Dental Surgery Program, Adams School of Dentistry, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
Department of Pediatric and Public Health Dentistry, Adams School of Dentistry, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
BMC Oral Health. 2025 Jun 4;25(1):910. doi: 10.1186/s12903-025-06266-x.
This study sought to inquire about the curricular content of the U.S. dental doctorate of dental surgery (DDS), doctorate of dental medicine (DMD) and dental hygiene (DH) programs regarding eating disorder detection, intervention, and referral services.
A 25-item questionnaire was distributed electronically via Qualtrics to 403 dental doctoral deans and dental hygiene program directors in the United States between June and December 2022. The responses were analyzed via descriptive statistics, and comparisons between the DDS/DMD and DH programs were carried out via Fisher’s exact and Wilcoxon rank-sum tests.
Complete responses were received from 11 DDS/DMD and 57 DH programs. The vast majority (96%) of programs included eating disorder-related courses and lectures, with DDS/DMD and DH programs devoting similar amounts of time to this topic (median times were 135 and 90 min, respectively). Virtually all the respondents agreed that early detection of eating disorders is important and that oral health professionals play a crucial role in this regard. However, only half of the programs reported referring patients for eating disorder-related evaluations, 32% identified appropriate referral agencies, and only 9% established a point person for such referrals. Most respondents (57%) suggested that the COVID-19 pandemic worsened issues related to eating disorders. There only significant difference identified between the DDS/DMD and DH programs was the identification of referral agencies for patients presenting with oral manifestations of eating disorders, with proportionally more DDS/DMD programs (6 out of 8) responding positively compared to DH programs (16 out of 47).
The study results affirm the importance of eating disorders as a topic that needs more attention in the oral health professionals’ training curricula and highlight several areas where specific curricular interventions can be made.
The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12903-025-06266-x.
本研究旨在探讨美国牙外科学博士（DDS）、牙医学博士（DMD）和口腔卫生（DH）项目中关于饮食失调检测、干预和转诊服务的课程内容。
2022年6月至12月期间，通过Qualtrics以电子方式向美国403名牙科博士院长和口腔卫生项目主任发放了一份包含25个条目的问卷。通过描述性统计分析回复，并通过Fisher精确检验和Wilcoxon秩和检验对DDS/DMD项目和DH项目进行比较。
收到了11个DDS/DMD项目和57个DH项目的完整回复。绝大多数（96%）项目包括与饮食失调相关的课程和讲座，DDS/DMD项目和DH项目在该主题上投入的时间相似（中位数时间分别为135分钟和90分钟）。几乎所有受访者都认为饮食失调的早期检测很重要，并且口腔健康专业人员在这方面发挥着关键作用。然而，只有一半的项目报告将患者转介进行饮食失调相关评估，32%的项目确定了合适的转介机构，只有9%的项目设立了此类转介的负责人。大多数受访者（57%）表示，新冠疫情使与饮食失调相关的问题恶化。DDS/DMD项目和DH项目之间唯一确定的显著差异是确定有饮食失调口腔表现患者的转介机构，与DH项目（47个中有16个）相比，DDS/DMD项目中给出肯定回复的比例更高（8个中有6个）。
研究结果证实了饮食失调作为口腔健康专业人员培训课程中需要更多关注的主题的重要性，并突出了几个可以进行具体课程干预的领域。
在线版本包含可在10.1186/s12903-025-06266-x获取的补充材料。
