Abstract
Recently, many investigations about tooth wear (attrition, erosion and abrasion) have been carried out worldwide, and the prevalence, preventive measures and related factors have been reported. However, such an investigation of tooth wear has not yet been reported in Japan. Therefore, we conducted a cross-sectional study to clarify the condition of tooth wear and related factors in Japanese teenagers. Subjects of this investigation were students of a boys' junior high school and a boys' high school in Kanagawa Prefecture. The examination of tooth wear was carried out to separately classify and record attrition, erosion and abrasion (represented by a wedge-shaped defect). We collected data on related factors through a questionnaire survey, and analyzed their relationship with attrition, erosion and wedge-shaped defect separately. As a result, the prevalence of tooth wear was 29.2%, the breakdown of which was 28.3% attrition, 1.1% erosion, 0.5% wedge-shaped defect. Age was the only significant factor related to erosion when the factors related to attrition, erosion and wedge-shaped defect were analyzed separately. Further study will be necessary after the validity of the study design and method of analyzing related factors is confirmed.
