Dental caries status of HIV infected children in Nigeria

HIV positive children may be prone to developing Dental Caries due to prolonged and frequent use of sucrose containing medications and poor feeding practices.

To determine the caries status of primary and permanent dentition in HIV positive Nigerian children using dmft/DMFT indices.

One hundred and twelve HIV positive children aged 4 months to 13 years attending two dedicated HIV outpatient clinics were examined for dental caries of primary and permanent dentition using the WHO criteria. Carious lesions were recorded using the dmft and DMFT indices in the primary and permanent dentition respectively.

Forty four [39.3%] of the 112 children examined had dental caries mainly in the primary dentition in 96.7% of the cases. Mean dmft was 1.15 +/- 1.88, mean DMFT was 0.17 +/- 0.57. Dental caries was not significantly associated with the immune status of HIV positive children; chi2 = 2.58, P = 0.275.

Dental caries experience in the primary dentition of these HIV positive children was greater than in the Nigerian paediatric population. Dental caries prevalence in these HIV positive children although lower than that seen in developed countries was however higher than in other reports of healthy Nigerian children. There was no significant association between dental caries and immune status of HIV positive children.