Malpractice allegations among US dentists: association of malpractice allegation with the severity of the alleged malpractice injury

The objective of this study was to explore associations between allegations of malpractice and the severity of the alleged malpractice injury. The public-use data file of the National Practitioner Data Bank was used to identify 34,042 dentist malpractice reports from January 1, 2010, through December 31, 2020. Univariate descriptive analysis was conducted to identify frequencies of malpractice allegations when classified by the severity of the alleged malpractice injury, practitioner graduation year, and year of original report processing. Ordinal logistic regression analyses were conducted to explore associations between the malpractice allegation type and the severity of the alleged malpractice injury. A total of 15,183 valid reports were used in the analysis. Compared with treatment-related allegations, a surgery-related allegation proved 5.3 times more likely to result in minor permanent injury; a diagnosis-related allegation was 6.5 times more likely to result in significant permanent injury and 10.4 times more likely to result in major permanent injury; and an anesthesia-related allegation was 6.2 times more likely to result in major permanent injury. The confounding variable of graduation year proved significant with respect to major temporary and minor permanent injury. As the allegation group advanced from diagnosis-related to anesthesia-, treatment-, and surgery-related allegations, the odds of a higher severity of injury did not increase. Establishing a proper diagnosis and developing a treatment plan to manage the anticipated complications of the procedure to be performed are critical to a successful outcome.