(PO-018) Enhancing Clinical Anatomical Relevance For Dental Students Through Surgical Dissections

OBJECTIVES. As the practice of dentistry is primarily focused on the region of the head and neck, first-year dental students often struggle with motivation for studying and/or understanding the clinical relevance for regions below the neck. For health professional students, placing content into clinical context often increases student interest with positive impacts on student motivation, content mastery, and exam performance. Concurrently, the number of hours dedicated to anatomy content, including lab, has significantly decreased over the years across all health sciences professions. The purpose of this study was to design and develop a series of dental-related surgical based anatomical donor dissection videos and prosections correlated to a patient case to enhance anatomical content mastery, clinical relevance, and student self-efficacy and motivation.

METHODS. A surgical-based dental patient case was developed centered around a head and neck reconstruction procedure involving a glossectomy with rectus abdominis flap reconstruction. Videos with embedded quizzing and guided in-person prosections were developed utilizing anatomical donors from the University of Louisville Willed Body Program. Patterns and themes of student attitudes, especially to self-efficacy and motivation, were identified with an IRB-approved voluntary survey.

RESULTS. Students were provided with the surgical anatomy videos and prosections at the time point of the course that the anatomical region of interest was currently being studied (rectus abdominis flap procedure with musculoskeletal and glossectomy with oral cavity). Analysis of survey data demonstrated that the inclusion of the surgical dissections improved motivation and confidence amongst students while also improving anatomical mastery of relationships and landmarks for the region of interest.

CONCLUSION. The utilization of dental surgical-based activities correlated to anatomy content for first-year dental students provides a unique opportunity to boost motivation, self-efficacy, and mastery of anatomical content in a clinically-relevant approach.