Assessment of subjective aesthetics of smile in various faculties of LUHS. Students' attitude towards the meaning of aesthetics of smile and orthodontic treatment

Relevance of the problem and aim of the work. There are many criteria to assess the aesthetics of smile. It is important to understand that everyone has a subjective approach to a particular component, so the assessment of future professionals in different fields may also differ. The purpose of this study is to investigate how the attitude towards the aesthetics of their smile and importance of orthodontic treatment varies between the students of odontology and students of other faculties of LUHS. Material and the methods. 349 LUHS students of faculties of odontology, medicine, pharmacy, nursing and public health took a part in the study. The 34 question survey that was submitted on „Facebook“ involves social and demographic factors, such as sex, nationality, year of studies and faculty, as well as aspects of individual assessment of smile, notable dental anomalies and orthodontic treatment. Examples of improper components of smile were demonstrated in self-drawn illustrations and various pictures of smiles, which were collected from database of LUHS’ department of orthodontics called „Dolphin imaging 11.95 Premium“. Statistical analysis was performed using methods of Pearson chi square and Mann-Whitney U tests on IBM SPSS Statistics 22.0 program. Results. Statistically significant differences between faculties were discovered. Not only are the students of faculty of odontology better at identifying and assessing certain abnormalities in their smiles (p0,05). Conclusions. The students of faculties of nursing and pharmacy have pointed out more improper features of their own smiles, while students of odontology had the most positive view towards theirs but orthodontic treatment was most common among students of this faculty also. Students of all faculties have a more positive attitude towards orthodontic treatment