Danish dentists' career satisfaction in relation to perceived occupational stress and public image

The relationship between Danish dentists' perceptions of satisfaction with their career choice and beliefs about their occupational stress or public image was surveyed. A mailed questionnaire was completed by 216 randomly selected Danish private dentists in and around Aarhus. Of these, only 19% were dissatisfied and would not recommend dentistry as a career to young people, while almost 60% perceived dentistry as more stressful than other professions and 31% felt that dentists' public image was less than good or poor. Odds ratio (OR) analyses indicated that perceived career dissatisfaction was most prevalent in dentists aged ¿45 years (OR = 3.1) or who had practiced more than 18 years (OR = 2.7), with perceived poor role image (OR = 3.0) or high perceived stress (OR = 2.1). The contribution of perceived high stress approached, but did not attain statistical significance. There were no meaningful or significant relationships by gender or practice type, location or size. It was concluded that perceived public image of dentists had a meaningful association with dentist job dissatisfaction and that dentists' perceived stress also contributed. A majority of the dentists wanted the dental association to help change their public image.