OPINION OF TEACHERS BY SPECIALTY 'DENTAL TECHNICIAN' FOR THE CONTINUING POSTGRADUATE TRAINING OF DENTAL TECHNICIANS IN BULGARIA

Postgraduate training of dental technicians is their right and obligation, to meet the expectations of patients and dentists in the provision of health care. On May 31, 2019, the Bulgarian Association of Dental Technicians was established. It is still unable to organize its activities in the direction - organization and control of postgraduate education. Our purpose is to find out if teachers are willing to participate in continuing education for practicing dental technicians, the directions in which they have the opportunity to do this and who should organize it. To achieve this purpose we used the following methods: study of literature sources, documents, sociologically, graphic and descriptive analysis to present the results. We found that, according to a large part, continuing education should be organized by Bulgarian Association of Dental Technicians, the second place is assigned to Bulgarian Association of Dental Technicians jointly with the colleges, and the third place is represented by the manufacturing companies of materials and devices. together with prominent specialists from the practice. Most of them are ready to participate in the postgraduate training of dental technicians, with the predominance of the respondents ready to organize courses in the field of modern methods and means for restoration of the defects of the dental crowns and dental rows with non-removable dental prosthetic structures. A small part of the teachers (27,78%) offer other additional courses, which will help practicing dental technicians: for development and management of practice; in the mentoring process; to create a publishing activity.