A Preliminary Study of Structured Health Education Programmed by Peer Educators as an Alternative Way to Maintain The Dental and Oral Hygiene of School Age Children

Abstract

Objectives: To differentiate between the control and treatment groups. Structured-health education by peer educators was given to the treatment group. In contrast, health education in unstructured way was given to the control group. Methods: A quantitative research using a pre-experimental intact group comparison design. Dental and oral hygiene observation used the OHI-S index that was checked by dentists. A dental check up was carried out on children who had mixed teeth (baby milk and permanent teeth), which was done by checking the incisors and molars 1 tooth. A consecutive sampling technique was used to collect the 40 respondents for each group. Students who were chosen as peer educators received training about the right time and correct way to brush tee th by pediatric nurse specialists using demonstration media and a module. Moreover, they received spiritual training regarding thaharah from local Ustad. Results: The median score on the OHI-S index for the treatment group was 0.9964 (good hygiene) with a range of 0.8372–1.1555 with a 95% confidence interval (CI). The analysing result of the OHI-S difference used the MannWhitney test with the p-value of 0.000 (<0.001). Conclusions: There is a significant difference on the OHI-S index between the treatment and control group after intervention. The peer educator with structured health-education approach is a good combination, which provides a suitable alternative way of improving the knowledge of school age children and creating a situation of mutual support among them in order to maintain good dental and oral hygiene.