Abstract
Aim: Poor oral health and high caries prevalence in young adults in Saudi Arabia is the result of inadequate oral health knowledge and inappropriate oral health behavior. The present study was conducted to evaluate the knowledge, attitude, and oral hygiene behavior of young adult students pursuing professional courses in Taif University, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire survey was conducted amongst the medical, dental, and pharmacy students of Taif University. A pretested self-administered questionnaire containing 20 questions was administered to the students, and the data were analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (IBM, version 20 for Windows, SPSS Inc., Armonk, New York, USA). Descriptive analysis and difference in the association were measured by using the chi-square test and Kruskal-Wallis analysis of variance, followed by the Mann-Whitney U test. The level of significance was set at <=.05.
Results: A total of 500 (287 males and 213 females) students were involved in the survey with the mean age of 23 +/- 1.4 years. Fourteen percent of participants brushed at least twice daily with statistical significant gender difference (P = .001). For the query regarding the reason for skipping tooth brushing often, 113 of total participants (22.6%) responded as no time for tooth brushing. A total of 93 participants (18.6%) responded that they have not visited any dentist in their life, with the statistical significant difference for gender being P = .001. The student who received dental treatment from private hospitals was 60.4 percent. Fifty-one percent of students responded that dental treatment is expensive. Sixty-one percent of participants responded for consuming sweet at least once in a day (P = .04).
Conclusion: The present study highlights the inconsistency in oral health behavior among the study participants, emphasizing on the need for oral health education of the population to improve oral health status.