Evaluation of Effects of Verbal and Video-Based Instructions on the Improvement of Oral Hygiene Status in Children: A Randomised Clinical Trial.

Objectives: To evaluate the effects of verbal and video-based oral hygiene instructions (OHIs) on the improvement of the oral hygiene status (OHS) in children of different age groups in the mixed dentition period.

Methods: In total, 202 children aged 6-9 and 10-12 years (n = 101 each) were included. Before providing the OHIs, the baseline OHS was determined using the Simplified Oral Hygiene Index (OHI-S). From each age group, approximately half of the participants were randomly assigned to the verbal (n = 50 and n = 51 from the 6-9-year and 10-12-year age groups, respectively) or video-based (n = 51 and n = 50 from the 6-9-year and 10-12-year age groups, respectively) OHI groups. Children were recalled after 30 days and post-instruction OHI-S were recorded. Data were analysed using Shapiro-Wilk, Mann-Whitney U, and Wilcoxon signed-rank tests. The statistical significance level was set at 5%.

Results: For both OHI methods, no significant difference was found between the age groups in terms of the OHI-S at both the pre- and post-instruction timepoints (verbal OHIs: p = 0.354, p = 0.860 and video-based OHIs: p = 0.174, p = 0.632, respectively). In both age groups, a significant difference was found between the baseline (pre-) and post-instruction OHI-S for both OHI methods (p < 0.001); the post-instruction OHS was found to be better than the pre-instruction OHS. In both age groups, video-based OHIs resulted in a significantly higher improvement in the OHS, compared with verbal OHIs (p = 0.004 and p < 0.001, respectively).

Conclusion: OHIs are effective in improving the OHS of children. In addition, video-based education is preferable to verbal instruction for improving the OHS of children.

Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT06449950.