Barriers to the treatment of childhood caries perceived by dentists working in different countries.
OBJECTIVE
To explore whether dentists' beliefs and attitudes to providing preventive and restorative dental care for young children can form a barrier to the provision of care.


METHODS
The Barriers to Childhood Caries Treatment (BaCCT) Questionnaire, a standardised international measure was developed and applied.


METHODS
Through a research consortium, each site was asked to recruit 100 dentists. The sample participating was not intended to be nationally representative. Dentists were mainly randomly selected and contacted by mail with one or more mailings depending on site.


RESULTS
2,333 dentists in 14 countries and 17 sites participated. Factor analysis identified four factors as potential barriers. Two factors were found to be barriers in many sites. First, in most countries, dentists agreed that young children's coping skills limit their ability to accept dental care. Secondly, dentists with negative personal feelings, for example, that providing care can be stressful and troublesome and that they feel time constrained. Differences in dentists' beliefs can be partly explained by their work profile, with those treating children often, and those working under systems where they feel they can provide quality care being least likely to identify barriers to providing care for children.


CONCLUSIONS
The BaCCT Questionnaire was determined to be a valid psychometric measure. Separately, it was found that health systems do impact on dentists' ability to deliver preventive and restorative care for children but that these effects vary across countries and further work is needed to determine how best these should be examined.
Pine
Cynthia M
CM
WHO Collaborating Centre on Oral Health in Deprived Communities, University of Liverpool Dental School, England, UK.
Adair
Pauline M
PM
Burnside
Girvan
G
Nicoll
Alison D
AD
Gillett
Angela
A
Borges-Yáñez
S Aida
SA
Broukal
Zdenek
Z
Brown
John
J
Declerck
Dominique
D
Ping
Feng Xi
FX
Gugushe
Tshepo
T
Hunsrisakhun
Jaranya
J
Lo
Edward C M
EC
Naidoo
Sudeshni
S
Nyandindi
Ursuline
U
Poulsen
Vibeke Juul
VJ
Razanamihaja
Noëline
N
Splieth
Christian
C
Sutton
Betty King
BK
Soo
Teo Choo
TC
Whelton
Helen
H
D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D001294:Attitude to Health; D002648:Child; D002652:Child Behavior; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D003695:Delivery of Health Care; D003731:Dental Caries / Q000517:prevention & control / Q000628:therapy*; D003793:Dental Restoration, Permanent; D003812:Dentist-Patient Relations; D003815:Dentists; D005260:Female; D006297:Health Services Accessibility; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011368:Professional-Family Relations; D011787:Quality of Health Care; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000523:psychology; D013997:Time Factors; D014094:Tooth, Deciduous / Q000473:pathology