Are there any limits to the dental treatment of children?

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ABSTRACT

Aim

The objective of this paper is to describe and discuss the most commonly occurring limits in care provision between a dentist and a child, i.e. provider and recipient.

Methods

The study was conducted online in the form of an anonymous questionnaire survey. We were looking for dentists to answer two basic modeled situations during the treatment of deciduous teeth (filling and extraction) in 4-year-old and 8-year-old children. Each modeled situation had 9 possible clinical scenarios. The age was chosen to factor the cooperation of a preschool- and a school-age child.

Results

When observing the subgroups of dentists, using a p value <0.05, a relation to age and experience of the dentists was proved among the 4-year-old rather than the 8-year-old children. Dentists with longer experience are more likely to make a filling or an extraction. Dentists with a shorter length of experience perform extractions. In total, 75.4–83.0% of the dentists do not agree with leaving the tooth without any treatment, and if the child is not cooperating they refer them to a university hospital. Dentists with longer experience and a greater number of treated children do not see barriers when treating a child.

Conclusion

The experience gained through clinical practice and the number of treated children show to be fundamental for the treatment of child’s deciduous teeth and for the selection of a treatment method. Dentists acquire sufficient knowledge through their education in the faculties of medicine. The limit is the child itself, therefore it is desirable to build specialised centres for their treatment.

Statistics

Statistical analysis was performed by an independent statistician using MedCalc programmes. Level of statistical significance was set at 95% probability of hypotheses validity (p = 0.05).

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