A questionnaire survey of dental students in Japan, China, and Indonesia about denture cleansers

Guang Hong, DDS, PhD,(a) Ying-Ai Li, DDS, PhD,(b) Yun-Min Lian, DDS,(c) Shinsuke Sadamori, DDS, PhD,(b) Taizo Hamada, DDS, PhD,(a) and Hiroshi Murata, DDS, PhD(d)

(a)Department of Oral Health Care Promotion, Graduate School of Dentistry, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan, (b)Department of Prosthetic Dentistry, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan, (c)Department of Prosthetic Dentistry, The Second Hospital of Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, P. R. China, and (d)Department of Prosthetic Dentistry, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Nagasaki University, Nagasaki, Japan



Purpose: It is not definite about how much knowledge, experience, and opinion the dental students have about denture cleansers. The purpose of this study was to investigate the interest and knowledge about denture cleansers of dental student in Japan, China, and Indonesia.
Materials and Methods: Forty-seven dental students from Japan (Hiroshima University), 38 dental students from China (Hebei Medical University and Wuhan University), and 29 dental students from Indonesia (Airlangga University) were surveyed in this study.
Results: The response rate was 92.1%. Significant differences were found among the three countries for all questions. For the question “Have you heard of denture cleanser?”, 100% of Japanese students answered “Yes”, whereas 40.5% of Chinese students and 13.8% of Indonesian students answered “No”. Japanese students recognized denture cleansers in TV commercials more often than Chinese and Indonesian students (Q8). For the question “Do you think the use of denture cleanser is more effective than a clinical intervention?”, about 75% of the subjects in Japan answered “Yes”; however, over 55% of subjects in China and Indonesia answered “No”.
Conclusion: The results suggest that there are differences in the awareness and knowledge about denture cleansers among the three countries of Japan, China and Indonesia. Chinese dental students had the least knowledge about denture cleansers compared with the other two countries. (Int Chin J Dent 2010; 10: 51-56.)

Key Words: China, dental student, denture cleanser, Indonesia, Japan, questionnaire