Dentists have been in the media at lot lately for all of the wrong reasons, and not surprisingly it’s getting people riled up because every negative story chips away at the trust people have in the dental profession, making our job just that little bit harder.
Dentists have historically ranked in the top five most trusted professions, behind nurses, doctors, pharmacists and teachers, however trust in dentists peaked in 2017 before declining through to 2021 mirroring a decline across the other professions suggesting that is not uniquely a dental problem.
So where has the trust gone? And how can we get it back?
Trust is a belief in the reliability, truth, or ability of someone or something.
Taking medicine requires trust in the company who made it, the researchers who performed the clinical trials, the doctor who prescribed it and the pharmacist who filled the prescription. Your very life depends on it.
When we start to chip away at trust in people or institutions - when they don’t do what they said they would do - people feel betrayed. So trust involves a degree of vulnerability because there is that risk of betrayal. And when trust is repeatedly broken, people become sceptical and more risk averse.
We know that patients who trust their healthcare provider are more likely to engage positively with their treatment, more likely to follow directions or care instructions, and therefore more likely to improve their health. Conversely lack of trust leads to lower patient satisfaction, increased anxiety, lower compliance and poorer health outcomes.
In this episode of the Dental As Anything podcast, we discuss the important issue of trust - what it is, why it’s important and why we are seeing a gradual erosion of trust - in individuals and institutions. Rebuilding trust requires accountability, high standards of honesty and integrity, openness and transparency and most importantly good communication. Ultimately, building and maintaining trust is important for everyone, and therefore is everyone’s responsibility.
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