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An innovative approach to teaching cross-cultural communication among dental students

British Dental Journal volume 233, pages 879–884 (2022)Cite this article

Abstract

Introduction There is a lack of concordance in demographics between dental professionals and their patients. Professional organisations have recognised the necessity of cultural competency training in dental education. This study sought to employ and evaluate a novel intervention in cultural competency training on cross-cultural communication for undergraduate dental students.

Material and methods The session employed dyad training, roleplaying, Kleinman's Explanatory Model and introduced the new 'Model for Negotiating Across Cultures', applied to patients' cultures. Learners included 24 first-year and 27 third-year dental students. Evaluation compared pre- and post-intervention responses to the modified Health Belief Attitudes Survey (HBAS). Paired t-tests were conducted to determine difference in pre- and post-intervention scores.

Results For first-year students, the mean difference improvement between the pre- and post-intervention surveys for each HBAS domain was statistically significant (p <0.05). For the third-year students, improvement was significant in all domains except for quality (p = 0.083).

Discussion Dental students were found to have improved cultural competency scores by the HBAS. Implementation of this educational intervention demonstrates a paradigm that could be implemented for cross-cultural communication.

Conclusion The intervention can be utilised as a resource for cross-cultural communication education for dental students and could be expanded for all health professional students.

Key points

  • There is a need for cross-cultural communication training in dental education.

  • The Model for Negotiating Across Cultures, first described here, improves cultural competency scores for dental students as measured by the Health Belief Attitude Survey.

  • This innovation may improve cross-cultural communication skills for dental students and could be considered for expansion for all health profession students.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. McGaw Medical Centre of Northwestern University, 420 East Superior Street, Suite 9-900, Chicago, Illinois, 60611, USA

    Joseph R. Fuchs

  2. Department of Surgery, University of Colorado School of Medicine, 13001 East 17th Avenue 61171, Aurora, Colorado, 80045, USA

    Andrew M. Tannous

  3. Office of Evaluation, University of Colorado School of Medicine, 13001 East 17th Place Building 500, Box F523 Aurora, Colorado, 80045, USA

    Gretchen Guiton

  4. Section of Adolescent Medicine, Medical College of Wisconsin, 999 North 92nd Street, Suite 460, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 53226, USA

    Paritosh Kaul

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  1. Joseph R. Fuchs
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  2. Andrew M. Tannous
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  4. Paritosh Kaul
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Contributions

Joseph R. Fuchs: formal analysis, data curation, writing - original draft, writing - review and editing, visualisation, project administration. Andrew M. Tannous: formal analysis, data curation, writing - original draft, writing - review and editing, visualisation. Gretchen Guiton: methodology, software, formal analysis, investigation, writing - review and editing. Paritosh Kaul: conceptualisation, methodology, investigation, resources, writing - review and editing, supervision, project administration.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Joseph R. Fuchs.

Ethics declarations

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

The survey and methodology were approved by the Colorado Multiple Institutional Review Board (COMIRB 20-2674). Participants consented in accordance with the Institutional Review Board's guidelines before taking the pre-intervention survey.

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Fuchs, J., Tannous, A., Guiton, G. et al. An innovative approach to teaching cross-cultural communication among dental students. Br Dent J 233, 879–884 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41415-022-5211-9

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