An Evaluation of the Usefulness of YouTube (R) Videos on Crown Preparation

Background. You Tube is one of the most commonly used online sources for sharing information and knowledge. Academic topics or clinical data shared on this platform is not peer reviewed or evaluated by subject specialists for accuracy. No study was found in the literature examining the validity of crown preparation videos available at this platform. Objective. To evaluate the authenticity of the content and quality of the crown preparation videos uploaded on the YouTube. Methods. The systematic search for YouTube videos was carried out over a period of one year from January 2020 until February 2021. The keywords or phrases and tags used were crown preparation, PFM crown preparation, all ceramic crown preparation, and dental crown preparation. The videos were shortlisted on the basis of inclusion and exclusion criteria to select educationally useful videos in terms of content and quality. Results. Three subject specialists evaluated the videos on crown preparation three times to shortlist only 12 (11%) educationally useful videos out of 109 relevant videos. These 12 videos met the preset inclusion criteria. Conclusion. Although YouTube is the most popular social media platform used as the source of information by the students, the majority of uploaded content lacks authenticity. This study found that crown preparation videos uploaded by the faculty members or subject specialists can be considered as the reliable source.