PREDICTING DENTISTS WILLINGNESS TO TREAT HIV-INFECTED PATIENTS

Access to oral health care is extremely important for those infected w ith HIV, because oral findings can lead to early detection and improve d staging and management of HIV infection. In addition, oral lesions a ssociated with HIV infection are often debilitating, but cart be manag ed effectively with proper oral health care. There is ample evidence t hat dentists have, at times, resisted accepting HIV positive patients (PHIV+). The intent of the research project described below was to dev elop and test a model predicting dentists' willingness to treat PHIV+. Data were collected from a sample of dentists practising in New York City. The dependent variable was a scale constructed of items measurin g willingness to treat PHIV+ under varying conditions. Independent var iables were entered into a multiple linear regression equation in iter ative attempts to arrive at a model-predicting dentists' willingness t o treat PHIV+, which was both parsimonious and had explanatory power. The final model included five independent variables measuring (1) perc eived safety; (2) willingness to treat homosexuals; (3) perceived ethi cal obligation to treat PHIV+; (4) past experience; and (5) perceived norms of colleagues. Perceived safety and perceived norms of colleague s had by far the most predictive power of all independent variables. R (2) for the model = 0.58.