Abstract

The objective of this research is to assess the prevalence of dental caries in Nigerian preschool children and establish the proportion of treated lesions and to also investigate the association between oral hygiene habits and dental caries prevalence in the study population. Dental examinations were performed on 404 children aged between 18 months and 5 years and an interview were conducted for the mothers to obtain information about the child and her/his household. The children were recruited from primary health centres where pre-school children are routinely immunized in Lagos State. The prevalence of dental caries in the study population was 10.9%. A significantly higher caries occurrence was observed in children older than 3 years than in those less than 3 years of age (p < 0.001). Caries prevalence was not significantly associated with who supervises the child’s tooth-brushing (p = 0.106), type of toothpaste used (p = 0.657) and frequency of tooth brushing (p = 0.774). Oral hygiene score was positively correlated with caries prevalence and the relationship was statistically significant (p < 0.000). While the prevalence of caries in the study was low, the child’s age and oral hygiene score were observed to influence the occurrence of caries in the study population.

Key words: Dental caries, oral hygiene, pre-school children, social class, tooth-brushing.