Prevalence of Dental Fear and Anxiety among Russian Children of Different Ages: The Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p> Objective Children’s dental fear may lead to an avoidance of seeking dental care or disruptive behavior during treatment. The study was aimed to evaluate the prevalence and scores of dental fear and anxiety (DFA) among Russian children of different ages with an experience of dental treatment.</jats:p><jats:p> Materials and Methods The cross-sectional study included 371 children aged 2 to 17 years. Study participants were divided into three groups according to their age: 112 “preschool children” aged 2 to 5 years, 137 “school children” aged 6 to 11 years, and 122 “adolescents” aged 12 to 18 years. The questionnaires were distributed at reception areas of the dental clinic to parents of children aged 2 to 5 years and to the older children themselves.</jats:p><jats:p> Statistical Analysis Data analysis was performed using SPSS version 15.0. The parametric tests were used (one-way ANOVA, Student’s t-test, and Pearson’s correlation) because of the expected sample of more than 100 observations. The chi-square test was used for categorical variables.</jats:p><jats:p> Results The data have shown that 93.8% of the Russian child population visiting dental offices suffer mostly from moderate (11.85) levels of DFA. DFA was more often revealed in girls and among the youngest children aged 2 to 5 years.</jats:p><jats:p> Conclusions According to the obtained results, children were more afraid of “tooth drilling” and an “injection of local anesthetic” than other factors mentioned in the questionnaires. Fear of dental treatment is common among Russian children, and the factors associated with it differ with the gender and age of the child.</jats:p>

Prevalence and risk factors of children’s dental anxiety in China: a longitudinal study

“…In the literature of recent years, there is considerable variation in the designs of study and target populations, particularly in the scales used for measurement and the age of the children, so that the reported prevalence of dental fear and anxiety in children varies widely, ranging from 7.4% 9 to 93.8%. 10 It can be said that there is currently no fully ideal dental anxiety scale for children in use. Efforts should therefore continue to be directed towards the development and validation of suitable instruments for the detection of dental anxiety in children.…”

“…In the literature of recent years, there is considerable variation in the designs of study and target populations, particularly in the scales used for measurement and the age of the children, so that the reported prevalence of dental fear and anxiety in children varies widely, ranging from 7.4% 9 to 93.8%. 10…”

Dental Fear and Associated Factors among Children and Adolescents: A School-Based Study in Lithuania

“…This conclusion is further supported by the fact that the sample that we examined was older than those in the studies cited above. There is almost total agreement in the literature that younger children tend to admit their fears more freely than older ones, and dental anxiety is expected to decrease as age advances [5,16,17]. The high prevalence (51.7%) of dental fear among Lithuanian children, aged 12-15, was also found in a study conducted by Račienė a decade ago [46].…”

“…In general, a recent systematic review with meta-analyses conducted by Grisolia et al (2021) reported that estimates of DFA prevalence in children and adolescents taken from 50 studies worldwide, which used different instruments, ranging from 6% to 75%, had a pooled prevalence of 23.9% (95% CI 20.4-27.3) [5]. The prevalence of DFA varies considerably across countries, with lower estimations in European children and higher estimations in Asian children [16,45]. Therefore, findings from our study in comparison with other studies indicate a relatively high severity of dental fear among the Lithuanian population aged 13-18 years.…”

“…It is considered that DFA at a young age is a dynamic phenomenon and many contributing factors have been identified [4,6,9,15]. There is almost total agreement in the literature that girls and younger children are most often reported as more fearful than boys and older children [5,16,17]. Among other major factors associated with DFA in children and adolescents, previous negative dental experiences are often cited [5,6].…”