What factors contribute to the self-reported oral health status of Arab adolescents? An assessment using a validated Arabic-WHO tool for child oral health (A-OHAT)

Abstract

Background: The current study was performed; to validate the Arabic version of WHO child oral health assessment tool (A-OHAT), to assess the oral health status of Arab school children and finally to identify the important risk factors associated with the poor teeth and gum conditions of school children. Methods: A cross-sectional study with two-staged simple random sampling technique was implemented. A-OHAT, a self-assessment tool was subjected to psychometric analyses with the respondents being high school children. The Cronbach's alpha and the Intra class correlation values were computed. Paired t-test was performed to identify the differences between the readings after repeated administration, followed by the analysis for convergent validity. This tested Arabic-WHO Child-OHAT was administered to collect the data. Univariate, bivariate and logistic regression analyses were performed to report on the potential risk factors associated with poor teeth and poor gum conditions of school children. Results: Psychometric analyses revealed that the Arabic Child Oral Health Assessment Tool (A-OHAT) was reliable and valid. A total of 478 (N) high school children were subjected to the tested tool, of which 66.5% were male and 33.5% were female with a mean age of 16.28 + 1.04 years. 80.3% of school children had poor teeth condition and 36.2% of school children had often experienced toothache. Children had 1.5 times higher odds of having poor teeth condition if they had increased frequency of sweet and candy consumption. It was also seen that increased frequency of sweets and candy consumption by school children had put them at nearly 20% higher risk of having poor gum condition. Finally, children with the habit of using toothbrush had nearly 50% lower chance of having poor gum condition in contrast to the school children who do not use toothbrush. Conclusion: To conclude, the study provides a reliable and valid tool to assess the oral health status of Arab adolescents. Improper oral hygiene habits and diet were identified as the plausible risk factors for poor teeth and gum condition.

Impact of the Poor Oral Health Status of Children on Their Families: An Analytical Cross-Sectional Study

“…In a study that sampled 520 boys and 333 girls from the Jazan region, nearly 91% of them had at least one decayed tooth in their oral cavity [ 16 ]. These results were consistent with another recent study that utilized self-perceived measure to assess the teeth condition of school-going children [ 17 ]. However, the OHRQoL construct and subsequently the Family Impact Scale has not been administered in this region, thus portraying the dearth of imperative evidence.…”

“…Thus, the link to the questionnaire was emailed or sent through the WhatsApp messaging service. Nevertheless, parent’s perception to determine oral health status of children has been used earlier and found to somewhat represent the clinically examined oral health status [ 17 , 24 , 25 ]. Findings show that, because of the poor oral health condition of children, the parents reported the need to take time off from work, impaired sleep and regular activities, and financial distress, and this result was similar to the response received from parents residing in a more developed country with higher Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and a better healthcare infrastructure [ 26 ].…”

“…The sample size calculation for phase 2 was estimated using the values from a prior study, where 80.3% of children were found to have poor oral health [ 17 ]. The precision and power of the study was set at 0.05 (type-1 error) and 80%, respectively.…”

Individual and familial factors associated with caries and gingivitis among adolescents resident in a semi-urban community in South-Western Nigeria

“…Known risk factors for caries are poor oral health perception [ 25 ] and poor oral health behaviors such as low frequency of tooth-brushing [ 26 ], non-use of fluoridated toothpaste [ 27 ], poor dental service utilization [ 25 ], high frequency of consumption of refined carbohydrates [ 28 ], and cigarette smoking [ 29 , 30 ]. Sociodemographic variables such as sex (females are more at risk for caries than males) [ 31 , 32 ] and age (the risk for caries increases with age) [ 33 ]; and familial factors such as low socioeconomic status [ 34 ], birth rank (last primogenitors) [ 35 ], large family size [ 35 ] and parental living status (absence of one or both parents) [ 36 ] can also be risk factors for caries.…”

Does Dental Fear in Children Predict Untreated Dental Caries? An Analytical Cross-Sectional Study

“…Another study carried out in the capital city of Saudi Arabia showed that about 83% of children have at least one untreated carious tooth [ 6 ]. Furthermore, the prevalence of tooth decay and gum diseases was nearly the same in children of the less developed province of Jazan [ 8 ]. Thus, it is plausible that there is underutilization of free oral health services in Saudi Arabia, leading to increased oral health problems in children, and dental fear could be one of the important factors.…”