Health behaviors and family characteristics in early childhood influence caries development. A longitudinal study based on data from MoBa

Abstract

Background: Lifestyle diseases including dental caries are partly preventable, and associated with health behavior. Establishing favorable health behavior is one main challenge both in general and dental health services. The purpose of this paper was to focus on cross-disciplinary research that has the potential to prevent development of both dental caries and other lifestyle diseases. More specifically the aim was to study how family characteristics and health behavior in pregnancy and early childhood influence caries development in preschool children. Material and methods: Data from dental examination of 5 year old children in the public dental services was linked to data from MoBa. In total, 1348 children were followed from pregnancy to 5 years of age. The data has provided opportunity to follow longitudinally the development of oral health behavior in early childhood in a large sample, and to study associations between caries development during preschool age and information in the MoBa database. Results:Results from the studies showed that tooth brushing frequency established at 1.5 year of age was stable through preschool age. Caries development in preschool age was related to child and maternal risk behavior in early childhood and to characteristics of risk families. Conclusion: Cross-disciplinary research using MoBa data has given new knowledge on dental caries development in early childhood in Norway. This knowledge can be used in clinical practice both in general and dental health services to improve preventive efforts towards early childhood caries and other lifestyle diseases.

Systematic Review of Evidence Pertaining to Factors That Modify Risk of Early Childhood Caries

“…The highest-level evidence came from the 6 cohort studies, for which analysis classified the risk of bias to be very serious, primarily due to risk of confounding and weaknesses in experimental design. Five of the 6 studies showed significantly higher ECC in children who consumed a higher level of drinks containing free sugars (vs. lower/no drinks; Wendt and Birkhed 1995; Wendt et al 1996; Warren et al 2009; Watanabe et al 2014; Wigen and Wang 2014), and 1 study found no significant difference (Yonezu et al 2006). However, this study compared ECC between those consuming 3 and 2 drinks per week and not nonconsumers.…”

Risk Behaviors and Practices Toward Dental Health of School Children at Selected Primary Schools in Rwanda

“…Toothbrushes must be changed every 3 months. [9] The study results revealed that there is a statistically signi cant difference in the frequency of dentist visits between urban children and rural participants (p = 0.026). Participants from rural areas (48%) reported never having visited a dentist compared to 40% from urban areas.…”

The Reasons for Extraction of primary teeth: The Patternand Its Association with Sociodemographic Factor at Dental Hospital, Universitas Sumatera Utara in 2019 – 2020

“…This means giving more attention to preventive care, like teaching kids and their parents about how important oral health is, promoting oral health in schools, and doing preventive things like putting sealants in fissures and repairing molar deciduous teeth to keep them from getting cavities. [1,2,16] Also, most of the people who came to our clinic for treatment came from low-income or low-social-status homes, and their parents needed more education about things like what to eat and how to brush their teeth.…”

“…The impact could disrupt the child's education by causing a variety of issues, including difficulty ingesting and rapid onset of illness. [1,2] Deciduous teeth play a crucial role in the stimulation and formation of dental arches, normal occlusion connections, maintenance of beauty, development of speech function, improvement of mastication efficiency, and enhancement of quality of life. There have been numerous initiatives to preserve the teeth's functionality.…”