ArticleBMC medical ethics2015
How much dentists are ethically concerned about overtreatment; a vignette-based survey in Switzerland.
Article in BMC medical ethics, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 33 citations in OpenAlex.
- Aesthetic dentistry and ethics: a systematic review of marketing practices and overtreatment in cosmetic dental procedures.BMC medical ethics · 2025Pooled it
- Ethical challenges in aesthetic dentistry: a qualitative exploration.BMC medical ethics · 2026Article
- Shades of knowledge: awareness among Brazilian dentists on non- and microinvasive approaches for tooth discoloration.Journal of applied oral science : revista FOB · 2026Observational
- Artificial intelligence in dentistry: insights and expectations from Swiss dental professionals.BMC medical informatics and decision making · 2025Article
- Private practice dentists' conceptions of overtreatment: A qualitative study from Norway.Acta odontologica Scandinavica · 2024Article
- General dentists' treatment plans in response to cosmetic complains; a field study using unannounced-standardized-patient.Heliyon · 2024Article
- Rational Antibiotic Prescribing Is Underpinned by Dental Ethics Principles: Survey on Postgraduate and Undergraduate Dental Students' Perceptions.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Ethical Dilemmas for Dental Students in Greece.Dentistry journal · 2023Article
- Presenting a Comprehensive Definition of Unnecessary Healthcare Services and Their Drivers: A Systematic Review and Meta-synthesis.Medical journal of the Islamic Republic of Iran · 2023Review
- Inappropriate Topical Antibiotics Use in Clean Dermatological Procedures in South Korea in 2018: A Nationwide Population-Based Cross-Sectional Study.Korean journal of family medicine · 2022Article
- Overtreatment in Restorative Dentistry: Decision Making by Last-Year Dental Students.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Article
- Complaints about dental practitioners: an analysis of 6 years of complaints about dentists, dental prosthetists, oral health therapists, dental therapists and dental hygienists in Australia.Australian dental journal · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors at 4 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundOvertreatment (or unnecessary treatment) is when medical or dental services are provided with a higher volume or cost than is appropriate. This study aimed to investigate how a group of dentists in Switzerland, a wealthy country known to have high standards of healthcare including dentistry, evaluated the meaning of unnecessary treatments from an ethical perspective and, assessed the expected frequency of different possible behaviors among their peers.
methodsA vignette describing a situation that is susceptible for overtreatment of a patient was presented to a group of dentists. The vignette was followed by five options. A questionnaire including the vignette was posted to 2482 dentists in the German-speaking areas of Switzerland. The respondents were asked to rate each option according to their estimation about its prevalence and their judgment about the degree to which the behavior is ethically sound.
results732 completed questionnaires were returned. According to the responses, the most ethical and the most unethical options are considered to be the most and the least prevalent behaviors among dentists practicing in Switzerland, respectively.
conclusionsSuggesting unnecessary treatments to patients seems to be an ethically unacceptable conduct in the eyes of a sample of dentists in Switzerland. Although the respondents believed their colleagues were very likely to behave in an ethical way in response to a situation that is susceptible to overtreatment, they still seemed to be concerned about the prevalence of unethical behaviors in this regard.
Indexed as
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.