Abstract
After participating in a dental examination for children aged 18 months or 3 years at a health center in central Tokyo, we carried out a follow-up study in order to determine the changes in the incidence of caries at 18 months of age and at 3 years of age in the same individual children. Mothers were asked to fill in a questionnaire concerning the daily dental hygiene of their children at home. The children were assigned to the high and low caries risk groups based on their daily tooth-brushing habits, times of tooth brushing, snacking habits and types of snacks eaten between meals, and the presence or absence of plaque. The relationship between these factors and the prevalence of 3-year-old df children as well as the validity of the screening parameters were evaluated.
The incidence of df was significantly lower in children with O1-type caries than in those with O2-type caries (p<0.01). The dft and dfs incidences were also lower in the former than in the latter, but siginificantly. The df incidence in the high caries risk group was significantly correlated with the habit of snack eating (p<0.05), the type of snacks eaten (p<0.01), and the presence of plaque (p<0.01). With respect to the validity of the screening parameters, both the Youden index and the predictive value were high for the presence of plaque. The predictive value was also high for the O1 and O2-type screening.
These results indicate that the presence of plaque and the habit of snack eating deserve particular attention, and suggest the validity of the O1 and O2-type screening.
