Longitudinal Studies of the Natural History of Caries. I. Eruption Patterns of the Permanent Teeth

Abstract

Since the recognition of the potential of fluorides as caries preventatives, the interest of many dental epidemiologists has shifted from descriptive to experimental studies of oral disease, resulting in unprecedented advances in the control of caries and its sequelae. Judging from the proportion of effort in this direction, there has been a tendency to overlook the fact that the descriptive epidemiology of caries remains vague in several important, if undramatic, areas. Among these can be cited the equivocal explanations of differential caries experience between the sexes and among various racial groups, incomplete understanding of the relative magnitude of the genetic component in caries susceptibility, and a lack of careful documentation of attack patterns in specific teeth over time. Most of the existing body of information on the natural history of dental caries was developed some 20 years ago from the cumulative results of many cross-sectional, often non-comparable, observations of various population groups. Of the hundreds of such studies reported the most significant were probably those conducted by who utilized time-specific prevalence data to infer a very large amount of information about the influence of several variables, including duration of exposure, on patterns of caries incidence. These investigators have pointed out, however, that complete understanding of certain aspects of the epidemiology of caries requires longitudinal, rather than cross-sectional, studies of the same, stable population.2 4' 8 Information

Caries Resistance as a Function of Age in an Initially Caries-free Population

“…This result suggested that, to improve dental health in this high-risk population, we should take protective measures to promote healthy dental hygiene behavior for children and adolescents between 1 and 18 yrs of age, because there is no "threshold age" after which a caries-free person's risk of caries onset is significantly reduced. The continuous decline of caries onset risk with age differs from findings reported by the classic dental study by Carlos and Gittelsohn (1965) and later supported by Harkanen et al (2002), showing that the "caries attack risk" of permanent teeth peaks 2 to 4 yrs after tooth eruption and declines thereafter. The difference between our study results and earlier ones stems from our exclusion of individuals with caries at enrollment; thus, older participants had already passed the peak of caries attack risk, while young participants experienced higher caries attack risk at the second visit.…”

A Randomised Controlled Trial of the Efficacy of Supervised Toothbrushing in High-Caries-Risk Children

“…This effect of dental immaturity has been known for many years from longitudinal studies of the natural history of caries [Carlos and Gittelsohn, 1965]. Children with recently erupted or erupting teeth have the greatest potential to show a benefit with an effective caries-preventive agent (table 3).…”

Interaction of lifestyle, behaviour or systemic diseases with dental caries and periodontal diseases: consensus report of group 2 of the joint EFP/ORCA workshop on the boundaries between caries and periodontal diseases

“…Caries risk is particularly high in the young during the early posteruptive years of the primary and permanent dentition (Carlos & Gittelsohn 1965). Early childhood caries may arise due to incorrect feeding habits (increased sugar exposure during weaning, bottle feeding or prolonged nocturnal breast-feeding) (Avila et al 2015, Tham et al 2015.…”