Uso regular de serviços odontológicos ao longo da vida e a saúde bucal de adolescentes participantes de uma coorte de nascimentos

Abstract

The objective of the study was to analyze the association between the use of dental services and the outcomes of dental caries in mixed dentition, dental plaque and gingival bleeding in adolescents belonging to the Cohort of Birth. The study has a longitudinal design. Those born from September to December 2004 were selected, totaling 1.303 adolescents. The first oral examination was carried out in 2009 and the second in 2017. Dental caries in mixed dentition was measured using the CPOS + ceos indexes. The average of the decayed component was an outcome used. The condition of gingival bleeding was determined using the modified Community Periodontal Index. The plaque index used was the simplified oral hygiene index. The exposure variable of interest was the regular use of dental services. The variables related to the mother were: age at birth, income mobility during life and education. The variables related to adolescents were: sex, skin color, consumption of sweets and sugary drinks between meals and oral hygiene. The data were analyzed by Stata 13. Descriptive analyzes were performed using relative and absolute frequencies and means and standard deviations. Crude and adjusted analyzes were performed. For possible confounding variables, Poisson regression with robust variance was used. A 95% confidence interval was considered significant and associations with a p-value <0.05 by the Wald test. The study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of the Faculty of Medicine, Federal University of Pelotas. In the adjusted analysis, it was observed that the adolescents who used the service always on a routine basis had an average of the CPOS + ceos index, untreated dental caries and the plaque score, 51% (RM = 0.35 (0.25; 0.49), 65% (RM = 0.30; (95% CI 0.18-0.49) and 18% (RM = 0.75; (95% CI 0.63-0.90) lower, respectively, when compared to those who have always used the services to solve a problem. We conclude that the use of dental services throughout the lives of adolescents, on a regular / preventive basis, proved to be a protective factor in relation to the CPOS + ceos index outcomes, average untreated dental caries and average dental plaque score even after controlling for confounding variables, highlighting the need to increase people's awareness of this type of use, as well as organizing services to offer this type of use.