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Aim and Objective:The women in sex work have no felt need for oral health and much of the stress has always been on sexually transmitted infections (STIs). There is a need for a baseline data for the oral lesions of these women to further assist in the policy formulations and training of personnel for the identification of the oral conditions which need treatment. The aim of the study was to evaluate the presence of oral lesions among female sex workers in the red light area of Pune, India.Materials and Methods:The Community Periodontal Index and loss of attachment (LA) index was recorded along with the other soft-tissue lesions as per the WHO Oral Health Assessment from 1997. The calculated sample was 350. Systematic sampling technique was followed. The data collected were subjected to statistical analysis and analysis was done using SPSS package 16.0.Results:A total of 110 (31.4%) women had leukoplakia, 6 women (1.7%) had ulceration, 41 (11.7%) women had candidiasis, and 1 woman (0.3%) had swollen gingiva. As the age increased, there was an increase in the number of pockets. The percentage of women above 60 years had higher LA.Conclusion:The women in sex work are mainly spoken to about HIV and STIs. With almost all of these women requiring some or the other form of treatment, utilization of the available dental workforce with both government and public partnership could be the route.

Introduction:The overall rehabilitation of women in sex work is unfortunately limited most of the time only to moving them to another profession, but it should be focused on including health as an important factor. Factors that restrict regular dental care include misconceptions, dental fear and expense of dental care, unpleasant dental experiences, and socioeconomic factors, but such a direct correlation cannot be made in the case of such women. Until now, no study has been conducted related to the complete dentition status and treatment needs of women in sex work. Aim:The aim of our survey was to evaluate the dentition status and treatment needs among the brothel-based women engaged in sex work. Materials and methods:A pilot study was conducted on 30 women and the final sample size was estimated to be 350. All the women were above 18 years old. Systematic random sampling method was followed after line listing of the brothels. The dentition status and treatment needs were recorded using