Prevalence of Medically Compromised Children Among Dental Patients: A 10-Year Retrospective Study

Abstract

Aim:Medical conditions can affect oral health status as well as directly affecting dental treatment planning and patient management. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the prevalence of various medical conditions of those children in a community-based dental hospital.Materials and Methods:In this study, the anamnesis forms of 30,161 children aged 0-15 who were referred to a university dental hospital from a defined geographical area in southeastern Turkey between 2010 and 2020 were evaluated. Patients who had a medical risk and chronic/systemic/genetic diseases were included in this study. Those medical records for acute conditions, cooperation problems and isolated tooth anomalies not associated with any syndrome or genetic disease were excluded from this study.Results:1,619 (5.36%) of the patients included in the study had at least one systemic disease. According to the medical conditions which were examined and categorized, the most common disease group was neurological disorders (17.1%) and the most common disease was epilepsy (11.7%). It was followed by Congenital/chromosomal malformations (14.8%), while autism was the most common in this group with a rate of 36.7%.Conclusion:Obtaining a detailed medical history of every patient who is referred to the dental clinic is very significant in terms of treatment planning, non-routine required protocols and complications. Dentists and pediatricians should evaluate more frequently and more rigidly, using a multidisciplinary approach, children with systemic diseases whose oral and dental health is at greater risk as a result of their medical condition.

Keywords

• chronic diseases
• medical records
• pediatric dentistry
• medically compromised children
• prevalence