title: Development and application of a prediction model for dental caries.
abstract: The development and validation of a caries prediction model comprising 13 sociodemographic and dental examination variables on Grade 1 and Grade 5 children in the National Preventive Dentistry Demonstration Program are described. The objective was to derive a method of predicting children at high risk to caries early in order that preventive measures might be undertaken. True high risk children were defined in two ways: highest 25% of children based on their 4-yr DMFS increment, and their total DMFS score at the end of the study. In both cases, children predicted to be at high risk were defined as the 25% with the highest discriminant score. Discriminant function and logistic regression analyses were used to determine the extent to which the 13 variables collectively discriminated between true high risk and non-high risk children so defined. Sensitivity was approximately 0.50 and specificity around 0.82, using the 4-yr increment as the criterion for defining true high risk, and approximately 0.64 and 0.88, respectively, using the final DMFS score for defining true high risk.
authors.forename: J R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Abernathy
authors.forename: R C
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Graves
authors.forename: H M
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Bohannan
authors.forename: J W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Stamm
authors.forename: B G
authors.initials: BG
authors.lastname: Greenberg
authors.forename: J A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Disney
mesh_terms: D002648:Child; D004245:DMF Index; D003731:Dental Caries / Q000209:etiology* / Q000517:prevention & control; D005260:Female; D005544:Forecasting; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008954:Models, Biological; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012306:Risk; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors