Objectives: The aim of this study is to assess the attitude of National Guard Health Affairs’ (NGHA) dentists toward conducting and contributing in the research process, and to identify the barriers and obstacles they might face.
 

Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted using a self-administered questionnaire to collect data from 128 practicing dentists in NGHA, Riyadh. The questionnaire was designed based on reviewed relevant published studies, and then face validation of questionnaire was done. Non-probability convenient sampling technique was used so that all the dentists available during the study time period were included.

The questionnaire consisted of three parts: demographic details of the participants and past research experience, attitudes towards research, and barriers upon conducting research.

 

Results: The vast majority of our participants had positive attitudes towards research; 87.5% seemed to be willing to be involved in research, and 83.6% altered an element of their practice. Specialists and consultants were more significantly willing to apply research outcomes in their practice than general practitioners. Positive attitudes were also found toward the impact of research; 96.9% of our participants thought that by conducting research their knowledge increases, and 93.8% believed that career prospects would be better. In the current study, the main barrier to research was reported as time constraints due to workload and busy schedules (87.5%), followed by and lack of support from funding agencies to conduct research (84.4%), and lack of documentation and maintenance of records (76.6%). In addition, 81.2% of the participants did not report good interdepartmental coordination needed to conduct research.
 

Conclusions: A large majority of surveyed dentists considered research useful for their profession and showed positive attitudes toward conducting research. However, they considered it difficult to conduct research, with the main barriers being lack of: time, financial support, good interdepartmental coordination, and proper documentation of patients’ records.