Chairside learning on undergraduate clinics: general dental and human disease themes

Introduction Chairside teaching is an important part of dental undergraduate clinical education. Bedside teaching is well-reported in relation to undergraduate medicine but few publications relate to undergraduate dentistry.Aims and objectives To investigate the experience and benefits from chairside teaching/learning in the clinical years of a five-year dental programme in a UK university. We asked about general dental topic learning as well as human disease (HD) learning.Materials and methods An online survey gathered dental students' opinions on their recognition, knowledge and experience of chairside teaching/learning. We asked about clinics and clinicians and where they gained most from chairside teaching/learning. We encouraged free-text responses.Results Altogether, 127 students took part (62% response). Response rates approximated 60% for all three years. In total, 93% felt that chairside teaching/learning helped to a moderate/great extent for general dental topics and 73% felt that chairside teaching/learning helped to a moderate/great extent for HD topics. Free-text comments revealed students valued chairside teaching/learning and from which grade/level of staff they learned most.Discussion and conclusion Chairside teaching/learning is largely unreported and unrecognised in undergraduate education. Although not formally timetabled, enthusiastic staff with enough time to engage in chairside teaching can have a positive impact on student learning.