PREVALENCE AND FACTORS RELATED TO DENTAL CARIES AMONG 6 YEARS OLD CHILDREN IN NHA TRANG CITY KHANH HOA PROVINCE VIETNAM

Abstract

Dental caries prevalence among children is still high and remains a significant public health problem in all nations. Vietnam had confronted this problem for several decades and there are little available published studies about the prevalence of dental caries in children. The aim of this study are (i) to find out the prevalence of dental caries by using the decayed, extracted and filled teeth (deft) index and (ii) to find out the factors related to dental caries among 6 years old children in Nha Trang city, Khanh Hoa province, Vietnam. A cross-sectional survey was conducted during January to March 2014. Multi-stage sampling technique was used to randomly select 248 children from three primary schools in Nha Trang city. Oral hygiene of the children were investigated and the structured questionnaire were sent to children’s parents in order to collect informations regarding to characteristics factors, dietary, oral hygiene practice, supporting environment, accessibility to dental clinic and availability of dental clinic. Data was analyzed by descriptive statistics, Chi-square, Kruskal Wallis and Mann Whitney test. The results have shown the high prevalence at 88.3% with the mean of deft score 5.04±3.43. The proportion of dt, et and ft are 85.9% (4.33 ± 3.12), 23% (0.34 ± 0.69) and 23.8% (0.38 ± 0.82), respectively. There were statistically significant association between dental caries and the education of parents (p-value<0.001) the use of toothpaste (p=0.006) the frequent to dentist check (P<0.001) the cariogenic food (p<0.024 for the drinks and <0.001 for the snacks) the parental knowledge and perception on dental caries (p-value=0.14) SBDP and supporting environment (P<0.001, OR=27,95 % CL=6.248-116.673) and the distance from home to dentist office (p<0.001). From this finding could be suggested that more education on oral health for parents, teacher and children are urgently needed. Longitudinal study should be performed to confirm the results and minimize the limitation of cross-sectional study.