Qualitative research paradigm in dental education: An innovative qualitative approach of dental anxiety management

Objectives: Although qualitative research is becoming more prominent in health care, qualitative data are not widely implemented in medical/dental clinical practice, since clinical teachers are usually unfamiliar with qualitative research and feel unconfident about its reliability. However, this kind of methodology may produce valuable data to a depth that standardized quantitative methods cannot reach and therefore qualitative reports may be useful in order to assess the impact of several medical/dental disorders on psychophysical health of the individuals. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to describe a qualitative research paradigm in dental education, demonstrating how the use of qualitative dental anxiety data may enable general dentists to manage dental anxiety of their patients with greater success. Methods: A two-day pilot curriculum on dental anxiety management for general dentists has been developed enabling participants to prevent, handle or alleviate patients’ dental anxiety, implementing the findings of a qualitative analysis (instrumental and conceptual use) of individual fears and experiences in dental care of adults with dental anxiety disorders. Results: The patients described strong fears, mostly related to perceived dentist’s behavior, to the invasive nature of specific treatments/instruments and to the development of unpredictable and unbearable orofacial pain. This qualitative analysis also provided some newer