Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2018 Nov 30;23(1):60.
doi: 10.1186/s12199-018-0750-z.

Prevalence of dental caries and associated factors among primary school children: a population-based cross-sectional study in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Yazeed Abdullah Alhabdan  1   2   3 , Abdulhameed Ghassan Albeshr  1   2   3 , Nagarajkumar Yenugadhati  4   5 , Hoda Jradi  1   2
Affiliations

Prevalence of dental caries and associated factors among primary school children: a population-based cross-sectional study in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Yazeed Abdullah Alhabdan et al. Environ Health Prev Med. .

Abstract

Background: Dental caries is a preventable childhood disease, but public health efforts are hampered due to limited information on associated factors in vulnerable populations. Our study was aimed at estimating the prevalence of dental caries and identifying key associated factors in four major risk domains, including socioeconomic factors, child oral health behavior and practices, child feeding practices, and dietary habits among primary school children in Saudi Arabia.

Methods: A cross-sectional study design was used to recruit 578 male Saudi primary school children, aged 6-8 years, from 12 primary schools in five different regions of Riyadh. Children were clinically screened to detect carious lesions in primary teeth according to World Health Organization's criteria. Structured self-administered questionnaire was used to collect information on social and individual factors from the parents. The odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals of associated factors for dental caries were computed using logistic regression models; key factors were identified by systematic selection process that accounted for multicollinearity and bias correction.

Results: Dental caries was prevalent among children (83%, 95% confidence interval 79.7-86.0%). Individual factors, including irregular brushing, late adoption of brushing habit, consulting dentist for symptomatic treatment, lack of breast feeding, sleeping with a bottle in mouth, habit of snacking between meals, low consumption of fruits, and frequent consumption of soft drinks and flavored milk, were predominantly associated with dental caries in children, instead of socioeconomic factors (p < 0.05, adjusted R-square 80%).

Conclusion: Dental caries were prevalent in school children, and individual factors were predominantly associated with the disease.

Keywords: Associated factors; Children; Dental caries; Prevalence; Primary teeth.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Ethics approval for this study, including oral examination of the children, was provided by the institutional review board (IRB) at King Abdullah International Medical Research Center (KAIMRC) in Riyadh under protocol number SP15/081. Informed consent was obtained from the parents.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

References

    1. Vos T, Flaxman AD, Naghavi M, Lozano R, Michaud C, Ezzati M, et al. Years lived with disability (YLDs) for 1160 sequelae of 289 diseases and injuries 1990-2010: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2010. Lancet. 2012;380(9859):2163–2196. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(12)61729-2. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Al Agili DE. A systematic review of population-based dental caries studies among children in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Dent J. 2013;25(1):3–11. doi: 10.1016/j.sdentj.2012.10.002. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Petersen PE. The World Oral Health Report 2003: continuous improvement of oral health in the 21st century--the approach of the WHO Global Oral Health Programme. Community Dent Oral Epidemiol. 2003;31(Suppl 1):3–23. doi: 10.1046/j..2003.com122.x. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Hobdell M, Petersen PE, Clarkson J, Johnson N. Global goals for oral health 2020. Int Dent J. 2003;53(5):285–288. doi: 10.1111/j.1875-595X.2003.tb00761.x. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Gautam DK, Vikas J, Amrinder T, Rambhika T, Bhanu K. Evaluating dental awareness and periodontal health status in different socioeconomic groups in the population of Sundernagar, Himachal Pradesh, India. J Int Soc Prev Community Dent. 2012;2(2):53–57. doi: 10.4103/2231-0762.109367. - DOI - PMC - PubMed