Hammad Hassan, Syed Moiz Ali, Ahmed Amer Chaudhry, Sidra Riaz, Baneen Khawar, Salman Aziz.
Endodontic procedural errors and their reporting and referral among dental graduates working at dental institutes in Punjab: a cross-sectional study.
Khyber Med Uni Med J Jan ;15(2):96-100.

OBJECTIVES: To find the frequency and type of endodontic procedural errors encountered by the dental graduates and their reporting and referral in cases of failure. METHODS: This cross-sectional study was conducted from 1st January 2022 to 15th July 2022. Data was collected through online questionnaires using Google-forms distributed among dental graduates working in the operative department of four private and two public dental institutes in Punjab, Pakistan. Out of 269 graduates, 255 (94.7%) participated in the study. Data was analyzed by SPSS version-25.    RESULTS: Procedural errors were experienced by 222/255 (87.1%) respondents. Errors reported by male and female were 95% and 83.1% respectively. Most errors occurred during canal preparation (n=228; 89.4%), followed by access opening (n=208; 81.6%) and obturation (n=192; 75.3%) stage. Overall, most common errors were over- or under-extended obturation (n=192; 75.3%), ledge (n=161; 63.1%) and access cavity perforation (n=136 (53.3%). About 86.2% (n=220/255) of respondents tried to handle errors on their own. 19 (7.4%) and 48 (18.8%) rarely/never informed the department. In case of failure, 121 (47.4%) referred their case to their supervisor and 87 (34.1%) sought help from a colleague. Patients were not informed about the error in 29 (11.3%) cases. CONCLUSION: Most errors occurred during canal preparation, access opening and obturation. Most common errors were over- or under-extended obturation & ledge. Majority of graduates prefer to handle the errors on their own. Help-seeking from supervisors and informing patients need to be improved. A system for reporting errors and a hierarchical management structure should be established.

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