COMPARATIVE CHARACTERIZATION OF DENTAL CARIES INTENSITY IN INTERNALLY DISPLACED CHILDREN AGED 6–9 YEARS AND CHILDREN OF LOCAL COMMUNITY OF TERNOPIL REGION BY DMFT AND ICDAS II INDICES

Abstract

The state of children’s dental health is an important indicator of a society’s overall well-being and level of social protection. In today’s challenging times, internally displaced children are a particularly vulnerable group who experience chronic stress and changes in diet and hygiene, as well as limited access to medical care. This problem is relevant not only because of the upward trend in the overall level of caries in childhood, but also because new, more adapted prevention programmes need to be developed for socially vulnerable groups. The aim of the study – to evulate of the intensity of carious lesions of temporary and permanent teeth in internally displaced children aged 6–9 years and children of the local community of Ternopil region. Materials and Methods. In accordance with the set goal, a dental examination was conducted on 132 children aged 6–9 years at the Department of Paediatric Dentistry at the I. Horbachevsky Ternopil National Medical University of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine. The survey participants were divided into two groups: the main group comprised 77 internally displaced children, while the comparison group comprised 55 children from the local Ternopil region community. To assess the intensity of dental caries in the participants, the DMFT and ICDAS II indices were used, taking age characteristics into account. Statistical calculations were performed using “Statistica 8.0” (StatSoft, USA) and the statistical functions package in “Microsoft Excel 2021”. Results and Discussion. As a result of the study, it was found that in internally displaced children aged 6–9 years (main group), the level of intensity of caries of temporary and permanent teeth according to WHO criteria was characterized as very high with values on average, in this group 9.14 ± 0.32, against 4.27 ± 0.28 in their peers, residents of Ternopil and the region (comparison group), which was interpreted as an average level of caries intensity and was 2.1 times lower than in children of the main group, p < 0.01. The values of the ICDAS II index (code 1–6) in children of the main group exceeded the corresponding data of their peers in the comparison group by 2.0 times, respectively, p < 0.01. At the same time, in children of the main group, the values of the ICDAS II index (code 1–6) were higher: 2.0 times – in 6-year-olds; 2.2 times – in 7-year-olds; 1.9 times – in 8-year-olds and 1.8 times – in 8-year-olds of the comparison group, p < 0.01. The value of the ICDAS II index (code 4–6) in children aged 6–9 years in the main group was 1.5 times higher than in the subjects of the comparison group, although in 9-year-old children of the main group its data exceeded those in the comparison group by 2.1 times, p < 0.01. Conclusions. Thus, as a result of the studies, it was found that in internally displaced children aged 6–9 years (main group), the level of caries intensity of temporary and permanent teeth according to the DMFT index was 2.2 times and 2.0 times higher than in 6–9-year-old children of the comparison group, p < 0.01. The values of the ICDAS II (1–6) and ICDAS II (4–6) index of permanent teeth in the main group were also 2.0 times and 1.5 times higher than those in the comparison group, p < 0.01, p > 0.05, which was interpreted as a very high level of dental caries intensity.