title: Attitudes of dentists, working in Riyadh, toward people with a sensory impairment.
abstract: This study was conducted to determine the attitudes of dentists, working in Riyadh, toward people with a sensory impairment (SI), according to the Scale of Attitude Towards Disabled Persons (SADP). The SADP scale was modified to focus solely upon sensory impairment. The modified scale was pre-tested and then incorporated into a self-administered questionnaire. This was then administered to 600 dentists (response rate, 73.7%) working in the city of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The modified scale showed itself to be reliable, with a Chronbach's coefficient alpha 0.616 and four-factor analysis, which accounted for 38.5% of the variance. Ninety-four percent of the dentists were generally positive toward SI in the society. There were, however, significant variations in attitudes, with a more positive score for dentists who had worked for 30 years or more (p < 0.005), were specialists (p < 0.005), received little or no undergraduate training in this subject (p < 0.05), and who received their undergraduate training in Europe/North America (p < 0.001). However, in a stepwise regression model, all these variables were significant except for the years of practice. The modified SADP showed dentists, working in Saudi Arabia, having a positive attitude toward people with SI.
authors.affiliation: WHO Collaborating Centre for Disability, Culture and Oral Health, Department of Transcultural Oral Health, University College London, 256 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1X 8LD, UK.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: alSarheed
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Bedi
authors.forename: N P
authors.initials: NP
authors.lastname: Hunt
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D003815:Dentists; D004497:Education, Dental; D004651:Employment; D005060:Europe; D006801:Humans; D016015:Logistic Models; D008875:Middle Aged; D009014:Morals; D009656:North America; D019986:Persons with Hearing Disabilities; D011364:Professional Practice; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012529:Saudi Arabia; D012647:Self-Assessment; D012931:Social Environment; D013039:Specialties, Dental; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013997:Time Factors; D019987:Persons with Visual Disabilities