Snacking habits and caries in young children

Abstract

Dental caries is caused by a combination of infection and diet. This disease, if left untreated, may lead to pain, and impair the quality of life, nutritional status and development of young children. The objective was to investigate the association between snacking and caries in a population at high risk of dental caries. American preschool children (n = 1,206) were recruited in the offices of paediatricians. Data on sociodemographic characteristics, oral hygiene, breast-feeding, use of bottle and snacking were collected by questionnaire. Plaque presence, the number of teeth and their caries status (deft) were scored. The children sampled were 61% Black, 27% White and 10% Asian. Of the 1- to 2-, 2- to 3- and 3- to 4-year-old children, 93.8, 82.4 and 77.3% were caries free, and their mean caries scores were 0.16, 0.58 and 0.93, respectively. Multivariate partial least squares (PLS) modelling revealed plaque presence, lowest income, descriptors for tooth exposure time (number of teeth and age) and cariogenic challenge (total intake of sugar-containing snacks and chips/crisps, and chips intake with a sugar-containing drink) to be associated with more caries. These differences were also found in univariate analyses; in addition, children who continued breast-feeding after falling asleep had significantly higher deft values than those who did not. PLS modelling revealed that eating chips clustered with eating many sweet snacks, candies, popcorn and ice cream. We conclude that, in addition to the traditional risk indicators for caries - presence of plaque, sugar intake and socioeconomic status -, consumption of chips was associated with caries in young children.

Fig. 1

p values from χ² analyses within each age category are indicated in the figures. p values for merged age categories were p < 0.0001 (a) and p = 0.002 (b). a Proportion of children with caries by number of sweet snack items eaten most days. b Proportion of children with caries by type of drink reported to be consumed with snack.

Fig. 2

a PLS loading scatter plot with deft as dependent variable. b Correlation coefficient plot displaying means with 95% CI for correlation coefficients.

Fig. 3

PLS loading scatter plot modelled with intake of chips as the dependent variable.