PREVALENCE AND DIET HABIT AS DETERMINANT OF DENTAL CARIES AMONG CHILDREN ATTENDING THE DIFFERENT PRIMARY HEALTH CARE CENTERS OF ALAHSA REGION OF SAUDI ARABIA

Background: Dental caries, a chronic infectious resulting from tooth-adherent cariogenic bacteria is a the oldest and the most common disorder reported so far. Studies suggest that more than half of the children in the age group of 6-8 have had a dental cavity in at least one of their primary teeth and similar number of adolescents in the age group of 12-19 have had cavity in at least one of their permanent teeth. Dietary habit is closely associated with the development of caries. Frequent snacking by parents, taking sweet drinks to bed , sharing food with adults and maternal caries status were predispose to early colonization of cariogenic bacteria and hence damage to the teeth/ Bad oral hygiene plays an important role in promoting the development of dental caries. It has been reported that children from low socio economic, care givers educational status and dental insurance coverage are some important factors which influence the oral hygiene habit of children. Dental caries among children is also a major public health problem in Saudi Arabia. The present study was conducted at the primary health care centers of Al ahsa region of Saudi Arabia to assess the prevalence of dental caries among the children and its determinants. Materials And Methods: The present study was a cross sectional survey conducted at the dental clinics of Al Ahsa region of Saudi Arabia. The study sample was calculated by Epi info software assuming that 60% of the children attending the primary health care centers may be having dental caries (WHO) To achieve this at the 95% of confidence interval with an acceptable error of 5%, at least 320 children attending the dental clinics for dental problem were needed .The sampling was be done by stratified sampling from the list of all the children attending the 100 dental clinics of Primary Health care centers of Al ahsa district The sample was selected proportionate to the children attending the different sectors of Primary health care. The data were collected on the google specially prepared for this study which contained three sections. The data were entered and analyzed by using SPSS Version 24. Frequency distribution of basic information and dental caries among children were expressed as numbers and percentages. Bivariate analysis was conducted by using a Chi-squared test to examine the association between variables and to assess the relationship between basic information of the children diet habit and dental caries. AP value of < 0.05 was considered as statistically significant. Result:Atotal of 320 children were examined in this study. The mean age of the children was 6 years with std. dev. ±1.82 . The majority of the participant (60%) was male. The majority of the participants were from urban area (55.6%). Parents of the three fourth of the children (75%) were having the history of dental caries. More than fifty-six percent (56.3%) of the children were suffering from dental caries. according to the DMFTcalculation, As far as the severity of the caries is concerned almost nineteen percent (18.8%) of the children had low dental caries while 31.3% had moderate degree of dental caries and 6.3% of the children had severe grade of dental caries. Prevalence of dental caries was significantly more among the male children as compared to female children (64.0% vs.44.53%, P=0.0000. The children of the parents who had history of dental caries had significantly higher prevalence of dental caries (58.3% vs.50.0%, P=0.045). Frequency of meal per day did not have any significant association with the dental caries (P=0.239). The children who were taking others food in breakfast such as junk food had significantly higher prevalence of dental caries than those bread with egg , sandwich and bread with milk combination (66.66% vs.66.17%vs.58.10% and vs.47.10, P=0.043). The children who were taking fast food in their lunch had significantly higher rate of dental caries followed by those who were taking other food and non-vegetarian . food as their lunch (67.22%vs.663.54% vs.65%, P=0.045). Those children who were consuming snacks three times a day were significantly more suffering from dental caries than those who were consuming it one , twice or occasionally (61.66% vs.45.83% vs.53.12 vs.53.84%, P=0.032). Similarly, those children who were taking chocolate were significantly more affected by dental caries than those who were taking chocolate occasionally or never (61.07% vs.57.77% vs.50.0%, P= 0.023). Using of soft was not significantly associated with increase prevalence of dental caries (P=0.550). However, those children who did not have the habit of chewing gum had significantly higher prevalence of dental caries as compared to those who did not chew the gum (64.51% vs.48.4%, P=0.042). Teeth brush habit was not significantly associated with the prevalence of dental caries.