Burnout, depression and suicidal ideation in dental students.

OBJECTIVES: To investigate the prevalence, gender influence, and relationships between burnout, depression and suicidal ideation within the last year among second, fourth and fifth-year dental students. STUDY DESIGN: A cross-sectional study was carried out in 212 dental students enrolled in the second, fourth and fifth years at the School of Dentistry of Seville using the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Student Survey and the MBI-Human Services Survey, the "Patient Health Questionnaire-2", and the "Questions about Suicidal Ideation and Attempted Suicide". RESULTS: The response rate among dental students was 80%. Burnout prevalence in dental students was higher in second and fourth years than in fifth year (p = 0.059 and p = 0.003, respectively). Depression prevalence in the fourth year approached significance (p = 0.051). Prevalence of suicidal ideation within the past year was higher, yet not reaching significance, in fourth year. No gender-related differences were found. A significant association was observed between burnout and depression, and between depression and suicidal ideation (p < 0.001), but no association was found between burnout and suicidal ideation. CONCLUSIONS: This study has brought our attention to the high prevalence of burnout and depression, and reported for the first time the prevalence of suicidal ideation among dental students in preclinical and clinical years.

[Quality of life in long-term oral cancer survivors and comparison with reference values of Spanish people]. / Calidad de vida en pacientes intervenidos de cáncer bucal con supervivencia superior a 5 años: comparación con los valores de referencia de la población española.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Health-related quality of life data are becoming an important supplement to information pertaining to treatment outcome for cancer patients. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the health-related quality of life of patients undergoing primary surgery for oral squamous cell carcinoma 5 years or more after treatment compared with Spanish general populations norms. PATIENTS AND METHOD: Twenty-three oral cancer patients with cancer-free survival after surgery of > 5 years were enrolled. Health-related quality of life was assessed with one standardized questionnaire: the SF-36 Health Survey (Short Form 36). Altogether 23 oral cancer patients (mean age: 55.3 years; 82% male) were included 5 years after surgery. RESULTS: The oral cancer patients' SF-36 scores did not differ significantly from those of an age- and sex-matched sample from the Spanish normative population, except role-mental and social functioning domains. The patients had better significant results than population norms (Wilcoxon test, p < 0.05) in vitality and health perceptions domains. CONCLUSIONS: These results provided patient-reported evidence that oral cancer survivors lived with a similar health-related quality of life compared with the general Spanish population. Recruitment is ongoing and a larger cohort in the future will allow further analysis of the trends demonstrated in this cohort.