2022 Volume 72 Issue 2 Pages 115-121
This study examined recognition of those responsible for the expansion of oral medicine education (OME) in dental education. We mailed a questionnaire to those responsible for education at 28 dental schools in Japan. The questions regarded the expansion of OME and perceived factors promoting and preventing its expansion. The KJ method (named for its developer Jiro Kawakita, and also known as affinity diagramming) and Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis were used to group perceived factors affecting OME expansion, and cross-analysis was performed to discuss strategies for its promotion. Responses were received from 20 dental schools. Of the respondents, 55–95% supported OME expansion, while only 35–60% supported the current response to the challenge. In total, 66 items (35 promoting and 31 preventing) were described regarding OME expansion: 10 ‘society’ factors, 19 ‘medical care’ factors, and 37 ‘education’ factors. There were no significant differences in the distribution of these factors between University Establishment Standards and dental schools with or without medical schools. In SWOT analysis, there were 0 ‘Strength’, 26 ‘Weakness’, 35 ‘Opportunity’, and 5 ‘Threat’ factors. All ‘Weakness’ items were in the ‘education’ category, whereas the ‘Opportunity’ section included ‘medical care’, ‘society’, and ‘education’ items. The SWOT-analysis cross tabulation table included 63 of the perceived promoting or preventing factors in the ‘Opportunity and Weakness’ matrix. These results indicate that those responsible for education in dental schools perceived OME expansion positively as an institutional opportunity from a variety of perspectives, but they were worried due to insufficiencies of the internal educational environment of their institution. A framework strategy for expanding OME should not miss opportunities for social and scientific changes because of educational insufficiencies in dental schools.
