Effectiveness of self-efficacy in oral health care based on Muslim’s faith among junior high school students, Narathiwat province

Abstract

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effectiveness of promoted self-efficacy in oral hygiene care  in  relation  to  knowledge,  perception,  expectation  and  belief  in  self-efficacy  and  oral  health  behaviors on amount plaque and caries prevalence among junior high school students. A quasi-experimental study was carried out in all 3-public schools of Bacho district, Narathiwat province, Thailand. Schools were randomly allocated to experimental and control groups. All students in the school were recruited as sample that is 97 students  from  one  school  for  an  experimental  group,  whereas  118  students  from  the  other  two  schools  for control group. 4 consecutive oral self-care promotion sessions were delivered for experimental group in every two-week. Students in a control group received regular school dental health education. Data were collected before and after intervention of the oral health promotion program at baseline, 6-month and 1-year, using a questionnaire,  observing  tooth  brushing,  recording  plaque  score  and  dental  caries  prevalence.  Paired  t-  test was  used  to  compare  results  within  each  group  while  the  independent  t-test  was  used  to  compare  results between groups. Wilcoxon singed ranks test and Mann-Whitney Utest were used for non-normal distributed data. The results show that students in an experimental group had significantly higher knowledge, perception, expectation and belief in self-efficacy, and had better tooth brushing habit than that of a control group. The experimental group also had lesser plaque and had lower caries prevalence (p<0.05). Self-efficacy promotion towards oral hygiene care facilitated students to have better knowledge, self-efficacy, oral health behaviors and  oral  health  status.  Longitudinal  study  should  be  carried  out  to  monitor  the  sustainability  of  oral  health behaviors.