Teaching the use of resin composites in Canadian dental schools: how do current educational practices compare with North American trends?

The placement of resin composites in posterior teeth is now a common procedure in dental practice. The aim of this study was to investigate current teaching of this procedure in Canadian dental schools and to compare trends in teaching with those in the United States. This study complements other investigations in which we examined teaching of the use of posterior resin composites in dental schools in the United States, Ireland and the United Kingdom. A questionnaire was distributed by email to the faculty member in each of the 10 dental schools in Canada with responsibility for teaching the operative dentistry curriculum, including the placement of posterior resin composites. The response rate was 100%. More teaching of posterior resin composites was noted since the time of a survey in the late 1990s. The amount of teaching and clinical experience in the use of posterior resin composites in Canadian dental schools seems to be higher than in dental schools in the United States. As noted in surveys of other countries, variation among Canadian teaching programs was found to persist in relation to techniques and technologies used.