Prevalence of deep caries in preschoolers who underwent either scheduled or emergency dental general anesthesia. Does toothache make a difference? A retrospective analysis

Abstract

The Federal State of Tirol, Austria, has been presenting a high level of education and commitment in general and oral health issues [12,13]. However, a polarization of caries in children of high-risk groups (frequently coming from families presenting a low educational level or a migratory background) has occurred [14]. A lack of oral health literacy and language barriers may be causative. Caries and/or pain constituted the reasons for seeking dental attendance in the preschoolers admitted to dental general anesthesia (DGA) who were investigated in this study [15,16]. DGA presents an accepted treatment method in individuals who are (due to infantile incomprehension, dental anxiety, intellectual and/or physical disablement, or systemic diseases) unamenable to routine dental treatment, even though it requires high expenditure and implicates the risk of anesthetic complications [17-19]. DGA has been shown to enhance children’s oral health-related quality of life and dental behavior [20-24]. In acute settings, DGA provides a rapid onset of action and an optimal titration of anesthetics [25]. However, emergency DGA presents an organizational challenge with respect to the 24/7 provision of pre-, periand postoperative care requiring the respective medical and nursing staff. For the children ́s benefit, scheduled DGA in non-pain patients displaying carious lesions seems preferable to a stressful emergency procedure, also with respect to the possible conservation/restoration of carious teeth instead of tooth extractions. The question of interest in this study was, if the presence of toothache is associated with higher numbers of deeply carious primary teeth. The null hypothesis was that the prevalence of deep caries is equal Abstract