Background Early Childhood Caries (ECC) is the most common childhood disease in preschool children which often require dental treatment under Dental General Anaesthesia (DGA). Aim: To assess the effect of DGA on United Arab Emirates (UAE) children and their families’ Oral Health Related Quality of Life (OHRQoL). Design: A cross sectional study, using a DGA pre-and post-survey to evaluate changes in OHRQoL. A total of 173 parents completed Early Childhood Oral Health Impact Scale (ECOHIS) before and after their children (mean age 4.6 years) underwent DGA by a pediatric dentist in Al-Ain, UAE from 1st March 2017 to 28th February 2018. The ECOHIS and its effect size (ES) served to evaluate children's OHRQoL, the Wilcoxon signed-rank and the Kruskal-Wallis tests were used for statistical analyses. Results: The mean dmft of the children prior to the treatment was 13.8+3.07. Children’s pain and eating problems and parents feeling upset and guilty were the most frequently reported impacts at baseline. The ECOHIS scores decreased significantly (p < 0.001) after DGA, revealing a large ES for the child (2.19) and family (2.79) sections of the ECOHIS. Conclusions: DGA treatment resulted in significant improvement in all child and family physical, psychological and social aspects of OHRQoL.
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