Awareness of Maternity Protection Policy among Dentists and Dental Hygienists

Abstract

Background: This study was conducted to investigate the awareness of maternity protection policy among dentists and dental hygienists, identify maternity protection policies with low awareness, and determine whether there are differences in awareness depending on the occupation of dental professionals and the presence of children. Methods: We conducted face-to-face and online surveys with dentists and dental hygienists working in dental medical institutions, and analyzed the data of a total of 165 people. In order to determine awareness of maternity protection policy, 19 maternity protection systems were structured to respond with ‘know’ or ‘don’t know’, and one question was designed to survey overall awareness of maternity protection systems. Results: The study subjects were 23.0% dentists and 77.0% dental hygienists. The overall subjective awareness of the maternity protection policy was 1.53 out of 4 points on average, and by job title, the group of dentists as business owners had the highest subjective awareness at 2.0 points, which was statistically significantly higher than the group of dentists as office workers and dental hygienists as team members (p<0.05). Those with children had higher awareness of all maternity protection policies than those without children. Conclusion: In order to prevent career breaks in dental personnel and to balance work and family life, both employers and employees of dental medical institutions need to correctly understand the maternity protection policy. To this end, the government and dental personnel-related organizations should specifically publicize the changing maternity protection policy, and dental medical institutions should create a working environment where employees can utilize the maternity protection policy according to their life cycle.

Keywords

• dental hygienists
• dentists
• maternity protection policy
• work-family balance