Impact of an educational intervention on dental professionals’ ability to associate oral cancer risk factors with pathological changes: a before-and-after quasi-experimental study

Background – Early detection of oral cancer depends on dental professionals’ ability to recognise both risk factors and pathological changes in the oral mucosa. Educational interventions may enhance this diagnostic awareness, particularly in settings where exposure to oral cancer cases and specialised training opportunities may be limited. Objective – This study aimed to evaluate the impact of an educational intervention on dental professionals’ ability to associate oral cancer risk factors with pathological changes. Methods – A before-and-after quasi-experimental study design was used. General dental practitioners from multiple regions in Indonesia participated in an oral cancer educational programme. Participants completed questionnaires before and after the intervention assessing their knowledge of oral cancer risk factors and oral potentially malignant disorders. The primary outcome was defined as the change in correlation between correctly identified risk factors and pathological changes. Kendall's tau-b correlation coefficients were calculated, and differences between correlations were assessed using Fisher's r-to-z transformation. Results – A total of 177 responses were obtained before the intervention and 144 responses after the intervention. The correlation between identified oral cancer risk factors and pathological changes increased slightly from 0.464 [95% confidence interval (CI): 0.383–0.538] before the intervention to 0.485 (95% CI: 0.397–0.565) after the intervention. However, the difference between the correlations was not statistically significant (p = 0.8109). Conclusion – The educational intervention was associated with a modest increase in dental professionals’ ability to associate oral cancer risk factors with pathological changes, although the change in correlation was not statistically significant. These findings suggest that educational initiatives may contribute to improving diagnostic awareness, but more comprehensive or repeated training strategies may be required to produce measurable improvements.