• Grace Alade and Sunday Bamigboye.
• University of Port-Hacourt, Preventive Dentistry.
• Afr Health Sci. 2022 Dec 1; 22 (4): 284290284-290.

BackgroundDental technology students are Dental surgery technicians under training, trained to assist patients maintain good oral health. Hence, their oral hygiene is expected to be optimal.ObjectiveTo determine the oral self-care practices and pattern of utilization of dental services among dental technology students.Material And MethodsThis was a descriptive, cross-sectional study, consisting of 109 participants. The questionnaire had three sections. Section A had questions on sociodemographic, section B was on self-reported oral hygiene practices and section C was on pattern of dental service utilization. Statistical analysis was done using the SPSS version 20.0.ResultsThe mean age was 23.66 years; age range was 18 - 42 years. There were 20 males and 89 females, 95.41% of the participants used toothbrushes and paste, while 4.59% used both chewing sticks and toothbrushes. 22% used horizontal/scrub method of toothbrushing, 10.1% used modified bass method, whereas 5.0% do not know which method of toothbrushing they use. 81.3% of the participants had visited the dentist previously for routine dental check-up while 10.71% visited for dental pain.ConclusionThe self-reported oral hygiene practice of the dental technology students is commendable, however, further education on the importance of scaling and polishing is advocated.© 2022 Alade G et al.

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