american-dental-congress-2016_scientifictracks-abstracts

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Volume 6, Issue 12(Suppl) Dentistry
ISSN: 2161-1122, an open access journal
Page 55
Notes:
American Dental Congress 2016
December 08-10, 2016
conferenceseries.com
19th American Dental Congress
December 08-10, 2016 Phoenix, USA
Oral health and nutritional status of early head start children in a selected area of Dhaka city
Mst Mostary Zannath1, Begum Rowshan Ara 2, Jesmin Akter2, Farzana Sale2 and Sk Akhtar Ahmad2
1Atish Dipanker University of Science and Technology, Bangladesh
2Bangladesh University of Health Sciences, Bangladesh
Background: Food and nutrition affects the teeth during development and malnutrition and it may exacerbate periodontal and oral
infectious diseases. However, the most significant effect of food and nutrition on teeth is the local action of diet in the mouth on the
development of dental caries and enamel erosion.
Objective: The purpose of this study was to assess the oral health and nutritional status of early head start children aged 2 to 5 years
who attended the clinical nutrition unit of IPHN (Institute of Public Health Nutrition).
Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted conveniently among a total of 384 early head start children aged 2 to 5 years at IPHN
(Institute of Public Health Nutrition). Data was collected by face-to-face interview. A pretested structured questionnaire was used and
oral clinical examination was performed by following standard appropriate techniques and tools. Data were analyzed by the software
namely SPSS version 16.0. Formal approval of the study was obtained from ethical review board of BADAS.
Results: The mean age of the respondents was 36 months with the standard deviation of ±13 months. Majority (41%) of the children
were in the age group around 24 to 59 months. Almost all (97.7%) the children cleaned their teeth regularly. Common oral health
problems found among the children were Plaque (47%), gum bleeding (11%), gingivitis (14%), swelling of gum (3.9%) and pain or
infection with gross caries (23.2%). About 17% of children had the history of previous gum bleeding. Regarding the nutrition level
of the children, 6.2% boys and 6.8% of girls had normal nutritional status whereas rests of the respondents were malnourished.
Among the malnourished children more than half (54.7%) of the girls and almost one third (28.9%) of boys were suffered from mild
malnutrition. Significantly higher proportion of unclean teeth and gum bleeding were found among the children whose mother were
illiterate (p=0.001), having low family income (p=0.001 and p=0.005) and having large family size (p=0.001 and p=0.01 respectively).
But no significant association was found between nutritional status and oral health problems.
Conclusion: The study concludes that almost all the children clean their teeth regularly. Plaque, gum bleeding; gingivitis, swelling
of gum, pain or infection with gross caries and history of previous gum bleeding were the principle oral health problems among the
study subjects. Most of the children found to be suffered from malnutrition.
Mst Mostary Zannath et al., Dentistry 2016, 6:12(Suppl)