The aims of this study were to investigate dental students' attitudes toward people living in poverty and the extent to which their perceptions were associated with their willingness to treat those patients in their future practice. All 910 dental students enrolled in three Brazilian public universities in 2010 were invited to take part in a cross-sectional survey. A total of 766 students (83.7% response rate) completed the self-administered questionnaire on their perceptions of and attitudes about poverty and their intention to provide dental care to poor people. The responding students showed slightly positive attitudes about people living in poverty; however, a high percentage (35%) reported thinking they were different from the rest of the population. Nevertheless, most of these students expressed willingness to provide care to underserved populations in their future practice; this willingness was found to be associated with their beliefs about poverty (OR 1.65; 95% CI=1.41-1.94). Overall, the study found that these dental students had altruistic views toward people living in poverty. However, they seemed to lack a deep understanding of poverty that may prevent them from acting on their good intentions.
Keywords: access to health care; attitudes; attitudes of health personnel; dental care delivery; dental education; health care disparities; poverty; public health dentistry; social responsibility; underserved patients; underserved population.