Oral health promotion among rural school children through teachers: an interventional study

The lack of national oral health policy and organized school dental health programs in the country call for affordable, accessible, and sustainable strategies.

The objective was to compare the oral hygiene, plaque, gingival, and dental caries status among rural children receiving dental health education by qualified dentists and school teachers with and without supply of oral hygiene aids.

This interventional study was conducted among 15-year-old children selected randomly from four schools in Nalgonda district between September 2009 and February 2010. Schools were divided into four different intervention groups. The intervention groups varied in the form of intervention provider and frequency of intervention one of which being the control group. The oral hygiene, plaque, gingival, and dental caries status was assessed at baseline and 6 months following the intervention. SPSS 16 was used for analysis.

The preintervention and postintervention comparison within each group revealed a substantial reduction in mean oral hygiene index-simplified (OHI-S), plaque index (PI), and gingival index (GI) at postintervention compared to baseline in group 4 (1.26, 0.87, and 0.74, respectively) followed by group 3 (0.14, 0.37, and 0.12, respectively). The OHI-S, PI, and GI scores increased in group 1 (0.66, 0.37, and 0.34, respectively) and group 2 (0.25, 0.19, and 0.14, respectively). Mean decayed, missing filled surfaces score between the groups was not statistically significant at baseline and postintervention.

The dramatic reductions in the OHI-S, PI, and GI scores in the group supplied with oral hygiene aids call for supplying low cost fluoridated toothpastes along with toothbrushes through the school systems in rural areas.