Dental caries risk assessment in a Portuguese sample of 6-year-old schoolchildren

Introduction: The National Program for the Promotion of Oral Health defines a set of goals, in terms of oral health, recognizing the importance of assessing the risk of dental caries. Objectives: Assess the individual risk of dental caries and associated oral health behaviors in a sample of sex-year-old children. Methods: A cross-sectional observational epidemiological study was carried out in a sample of 221 six-year-old children of the Group of Schools Diogo Cão, Vila Real. A intra-oral observation was performed and a self-administered questionnaire about the children oral health behaviors was applied to the parents. To determine the association between the risk of dental caries and oral health behaviors the Chi-square test, with a significance level of 5% was applied. Results: It was found that 61.1% of the children had a high risk of dental caries. The decayed, missing and filled index for deciduous teeth (dmft index) was 1.93 and 52% of the children were caries free. Statistical significant associations was found between the risk of dental caries and the level of education completed by fathers/mothers of children (p<0.001), consumption of cariogenic foods (p<0.001) and poor oral hygiene (p<0.001). Only 14.9% of children brushed their teeth at school after lunch and only 48.4% learned to brush their teeth at school. Conclusion: It seems important that schools develop more projects and practical activities of oral health, with special emphasis on the daily toothbrushing at school. Progress in terms of oral health, has been very little. Thus, if there isn’t a turn around, we will hardly reach the appointed value prescribed by the World Health Organization for the year 2020 in Europe, which is 80% of children free of caries at 6 years of age.