Tobacco and nicotine addiction remain major public health challenges worldwide — not just for general health, but especially for the oral cavity, which experiences some of the earliest and most severe effects of tobacco exposure. A new multi-institutional study conducted across eight Italian dental schools reveals that dental faculty members — who serve both as clinicians and dental educators — are uniquely positioned to influence tobacco prevention and cessation, yet face significant barriers in fulfilling this role effectively.
Why Dental Faculty Matter
Dentists and dental educators have an intimate understanding of how tobacco impacts the oral environment. Tobacco use is linked to:
- Gum disease (periodontitis) due to impaired blood flow and immune response,
- Delayed healing after oral surgery,
- Tooth discoloration and halitosis,
- Increased risk of oral cancers,
- Greater likelihood of implant failure and other complications.
Dental faculty members, by virtue of this clinical insight, are ideally positioned to educate future dentists about tobacco’s harmful effects and equip them with cessation counseling skills. Yet until this study, little was known about faculty attitudes toward tobacco use and prevention education.
Findings: Tobacco Use Among Dental Educators
he study surveyed 241 faculty members from dental schools in Bologna, Padua, Palermo, Catanzaro, Insubria, Napoli Vanvitelli, Novara, and Trieste. It revealed:
- 13.7% of faculty members are current cigarette smokers, and 9.1% use electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) (such as e-cigarettes or vapes).
- Tobacco use rates varied regionally, with higher prevalence in Southern Italy compared with Northern schools.
These figures, while lower than the national Italian average, underscore that tobacco use still persists among those educating future oral health professionals.
Attitudes Toward Tobacco Education in Dental Curricula
Despite their professional roles, the study found notable gaps in knowledge and teaching practices:
- Only about half of respondents supported formal training in tobacco prevention and cessation teaching methods.
- Awareness of institutional tobacco policies was limited — nearly half of the faculty did not know whether a tobacco ban existed at their school.
- Fewer than 40% said that tobacco prevention is included in the dental curriculum, and even fewer reported actually teaching students about tobacco and nicotine cessation.
These findings indicate that even within dental education, where awareness of oral risks is expected to be high, tobacco prevention content is inconsistently integrated into training.
Barriers to Tobacco Prevention Teaching
Faculty members cited several challenges that limit their ability to teach tobacco prevention effectively:
- Lack of resources and educational materials,
- Insufficient class and clinic time,
- Limited training or confidence in delivering cessation counseling skills.
Interestingly, faculty who were themselves current smokers were less likely to endorse the need for tobacco cessation training for students, suggesting that personal behavior can influence professional attitudes toward prevention education.
Dental Education — A Critical Opportunity
Dental professionals routinely witness the early oral manifestations of tobacco use — from gingival inflammation to oral lesions and periodontal destruction. These clinical realities should ideally motivate stronger tobacco prevention training in dental schools.
However, the study shows that while many dental educators recognize the importance of tobacco prevention competencies, structural and educational gaps prevent this knowledge from being systematically transmitted to students.
Toward a Tobacco-Free Oral Health Future
To truly equip future dentists with effective tobacco cessation skills, dental education must:
- Integrate formal tobacco prevention modules into curricula,
- Provide faculty development and training in cessation counseling,
- Implement and enforce clear institutional policies on tobacco and nicotine products,
- Promote faculty engagement as role models for healthy behavior.
Tobacco remains one of the most preventable causes of oral disease. Dental educators, by aligning clinical insight with prevention teaching, have the potential to reduce the burden of tobacco-related oral health issues for generations of patients.
The study, conducted by Samuel Tundealao, Irene Tamí-Maury and Giulia Ottaviani, and published in the Journal of Public Health, examined faculty perspectives across eight Italian dental schools.
