Association between obesity, dental caries and socioeconomic status in 6- and 13-year-old school children.

PURPOSE: To investigate the association between dental caries, obesity and socioeconomic status (SES) in 6-and 13-yearold school children in Davangere city, Karnataka, India. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Data were obtained from a cohort of 1,550 children. Dental caries detection was performed according to the World Health Organization criteria and the medical evaluation assessed the body mass index (BMI). With appropriate sample weighting, relationships between dmft/DMFT, obesity and socioeconomic status were assessed using the Kruskal-Wallis H test and multivariate logistic regression. RESULTS: The prevalence of dental caries was 28.9%. The mean dmft and DMFT scores for 6-year-olds were 2.1 ± 3.75 and 0.16 ± 0.59, respectively, and corresponding values for 13-year-olds were 0.03 ± 0.19 and 0.91 ± 2.04. Of the total sample, the mean BMI was 16.56 ± 2.8. Approximately 63.4% of the children were classified as normal weight, 18.1% as overweight and 7.5% as obese. When adjusted for covariates, the logistic regression model showed that there was a significant association between overweight children (P < 0.001), obese children (P < 0.05) and caries prevalence. CONCLUSION: This study demonstrated a significant association between caries frequency and obesity in school children. In future preventive programmes, the importance of obesity should not only be emphasised with respect to general diseases but also with regard to carious lesions.

Survival of occlusal ART restorations in primary molars placed in school environment and hospital dental setup-one year follow-up study.

OBJECTIVE: The objectives of this clinical study were to: evaluate the survival of occlusal atraumatic restorative treatment (ART) restorations, on a longitudinal basis, in the primary molars of children; and compare the success rate of ART restorations placed in school environment and in hospital dental setup. STUDY DESIGN: One dentist placed 120 ART restorations in 60 five- to seven year-olds who had bilateral matched pairs of carious primary molars. A split-mouth design was used to place restorations in school and in hospital dental setup, which were assigned randomly to contralateral sides. Restorations were evaluated after 6 and 12 months using the ART criteria. RESULTS: The survival rate of ART restorations placed in school environment was 82.2% at the 6-month assessment and 77.77% at the 12-month assessment. The success rates of ART restorations placed in hospital dental setup in the 2 assessments were 87.7% and 81.48%, respectively. There was no statistically significant difference between the ART restorations placed in school environment and hospital dental setup in both assessments (P > O.05). The main cause of failure was the loss of restoration. CONCLUSIONS: The one year success rate of occlusal ART restorations in primary molars was moderately successful. The ART technique's done in hospital dental setup was not proven to be better than restorations placed in school environment.

Inhibition of Residual Cariogenic Bacteria in Atraumatic Restorative Treatment by Chlorhexidine: Disinfection or Incorporation.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to compare the efficacy of chlorhexidine (CHX) cavity disinfection and of CHX containing glass ionomer cement (GIC) in inhibiting residual cariogenic bacteria. METHODS: Ninety, five- to nine-year-olds were randomly allocated to three groups: Group 1-CHX containing GIC; Group 2-CHX cavity disinfection; and Group 3-conventional GIC. Total viable count (TVC), Streptococcus mutans (SM), and Lactobacillus (LB) were analyzed pre-, post-, and three months after atraumatic restorative treatment (ART). The results were statistically analyzed by one-way analysis of variance. RESULTS: At three months microbial evaluation, Group 1 showed 65 percent reduction of both TVC and LB and 67 percent of SM. Group two showed 64 percent, 58 percent, and 56 percent reduction of TVC, LB, and SM respectively. Group 3 exhibited 41 percent, 42 percent, and 46 percent reduction in mean TVC, LB, and SM counts respectively. Residual microbial counts for Group 3 were 0.41, 0.61, and 0.53 (105 colony forming units) for TVC, LB, and SM, respectively, which was significantly higher (P<0.01) compared to the respective microbial counts in Groups 1 and 2. CONCLUSION: Both chlorhexidine disinfection and incorporation showed superior efficacy in inhibiting residual microbes compared to conventional ART.

Evaluation of Effect of Brushite-Calcite and Two Indigenous Herbs in Removal of Fluoride from Water.

INTRODUCTION: The acceptable concentration of fluoride in drinking water is 1.5mg/l. Excess fluoride in drinking water causes fluorosis. Fluorosis is an important public health problem in India. Several treatment technologies suggested in the past for removing excess fluoride generated and causes various chemical byproductswhich are hazardous to public. In recent years, there has been a resurgence of interest to use natural materials due to cost and associated health and environmental concerns of synthetic organic polymers and inorganic chemicals. AIM: The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the defluoridating capability of the brushite-calcite with that of two indigenous herbs, tulsi and wheat grass. MATERIALS AND METHODS: One gram of brushite-calcite combination, tulsi and wheat grass were separately added to 10 containers, each containing 1.0 l of prepared distilled water with a fluoride concentration of 5ppm and naturally fluoridated water at 2ppm. Half of the samples were boiled for one minute in a domestic electric kettle for one minute and allowed to cool. The remaining half of the samples was left un-boiled. Fluoride concentration in all the samples was assessed at the end of 30 minutes and 24 hours using fluoride ion selective electrode method. Data was analyzed using unpaired t-test and one-way ANOVA. RESULTS: For water with 2ppm and 5ppm fluoride, brushite-calcite had shown highest de-fluoridation capacity (p=0.001) at the end of both 30 minutes and 24 hours in boiled samples whereas tulsi (p=0.001) was most effective in un-boiled samples. CONCLUSION: The results of the study suggest that tulsi can be used for domestic water defluoridation as it is economic, safe and effective.