Assessment of Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice of Pharmacovigilance and Materiovigilance among Oral Health Practitioners in India.

AIM: This electronic survey was carried out to assess the knowledge, attitude, and practices among the oral health practitioners.

METHODS: A questionnaire survey was conducted among undergraduates, graduated practitioners, and specialist practitioners. A Google Form that included a specified instruction format, informed consent with a clear description of the purpose of the study, and questions in different categories were sent through Whatsapp and email. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze responses. The association of knowledge and attitude with respect to oral health professionals was analyzed with the Chi-square test.

RESULTS: The questionnaire was completed by 570 participants. Thirty percent of participants encountered ADR related to the drugs available in the market and 33.2% of participants encountered adverse reaction related to materials used in practice. ADR should be reported as soon as it is detected, according to this study about 12.1% of participants reported the ADRs, and this reporting is primarily for patient safety. Almost 66.8% of participants perceived that dental products can cause ADR owing to a lack of information about ADR and reporting procedures, or due to fear of legal concerns. Only about 9.5% of the participants had previously attended an ADR workshop.

CONCLUSION: Oral health practitioners have a general understanding of ADR; however, there is substantial evidence of underreporting and a lack of reporting system information. Organizing an orientation program and raising awareness about ADR reporting could help improve spontaneous reporting and better patient care.