Impact of dental pain on daily living of five-year-old Brazilian preschool children: prevalence and associated factors

Autores: Moure-Leite FR, Ramos-Jorge J, Ramos-Jorge ML, Paiva SM, Vale MP, Pordeus IA.

Eur Arch Paediatr Dent. 2011 Dec;12(6):293-7. Qualis B3

Docente do PPGODONTO envolvido nessa publicação: Maria Letícia Ramos-Jorge

Abstract

AIM: To assess the impact of dental pain on the daily living of 5-year-old preschool children using reports from parents/guardians.DESIGN AND METHODS: A cross-sectional study was carried out involving 549 five-year-old children  randomly selected from preschools in the city of Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Data were collected using a previously validated parent-reported questionnaire. The children received dental examinations from a single calibrated examiner. The following outcome variables were selected: age, gender, dental caries, filled teeth, missing teeth, caries involving pulp and social class. Simple and multiple logistic regression analyses were performed on the data. RESULTS: According to parents’ reports, 11.1% of children were affected by dental pain
in the previous 4 months and of these 72.6% had their daily activities hampered by pain. The majority of these children had difficulty in eating, brushing teeth, sleeping, playing and going to school. The impact of dental pain had a statistically significant association with gender (p=0.001), social class (p=0.009), dental caries (p<0.001), missing teeth (p<0.001), filled teeth (p<0.001) and caries involving pulp (p<0.001). CONCLUSION: The prevalence of difficulties performing tasks of daily living due to dental pain was relatively high among the children studied.