Knowledge, Attitude And Practice Of Mothers Towards Dental Caries Causation And Transmission In Pre-School Children-A Questionnaire Based Study

Dental caries is the most common chronic microbial oral disease. More than 60% of children worldwide between the ages of 2 to 11 years are affected. The etiology of dental caries is multifactorial. Maternally derived streptococcal caries is caries transmitted to the child via the mother by practices such as sharing of feeding spoons. The awareness of such a caries transmission is poor among mothers and caretakers. Hence, the aim of the current study was to access the knowledge, attitude and practice of mothers towards dental caries causation, prevention and its transmission among pre-school children. A cross-sectional study was conducted across various day care centers, Montessori's and Primary schools in Chennai ,Tamilnadu. Inclusion criteria were mothers of children and who were of age 0-6 years. The questionnaires were made in English . Initially, a pilot study was carried out to test the feasibility of the questionnaire. Following this, the questionnaire was distributed to collect responses. 385 mothers responded to the questionnaire. Statistical analysis of the data set comparing the responses of the mothers belonging to various educational backgrounds was also done using Chi Square test on SPSS software. The results of the study showed an above average knowledge and attitude score. The mean practice score was much lesser than the knowledge and attitude score, indicating that mere knowledge and attitude was not enough for implementation of oral hygiene practices and further steps needed to be taken to implement it successfully.Although the responses were better in mothers with higher levels of education there was no statistical association established between the level of education of the mother and the responses obtained.(p>0.05) Also, it was seen that the knowledge of maternally transmitted dental caries was good to satisfactory but the practices in this regard were poor due to various reasons