Evaluation of untreated dental caries in children with PUFA index

Abstract

Objective: Tooth decay continues to come up as a serious health problem particularly in developing countries. Limited number of studies investigated the prevalence of complication of untreated dental caries as abscess, fistula and ulceration. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the prevalence of the clinical consequences of untreated dental caries among a group of children. Materials and Method: The study was conducted on 1200 children with ages between 5-12 years in the Department of Pedodontics, Faculty of Dentistry, GaziUniversity between the dates 1-31 March 2012. Caries in deciduous and permanent teeth were scored using DMFT/dmft and PUFA/pufa indexes (D/d: decayed, M/m: missing, F/f: filled, P/p: carious lesion with pulpal involvement, U/u: ulceration of the mucosa due to root fragments, F/f: fistula, A/a: abscess). Results: DMFT index was 2.34 ± 1.37 and dmft index was 4.25 ± 3.46. The prevalence of PUFA/pufa for permanent and deciduous teeth was 2.30% and 22.25%, respectively. The highest score in both permanent and deciduous teeth was caries lesions with pulpal involvement (%11.24 for deciduous teeth and %1.67 for permanent teeth). This was followed by abscess and fistula formation. Conclusion: The prevalence of clinical consequences of untreated dental caries was high for deciduous teeth in the selected population. The PUFA/pufa index is seen as an epidemiological tool complementary to the existing caries index aimed to assess dental caries.

Keywords

• Abscess
• child
• dental caries
• DMF indexes
• fistula