Early childhood caries and quality of life: child and parent perspectives.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of early childhood caries (ECC) on children's oral health-related quality of life (QOL) before and 4 weeks after its treatment, as assessed by the children themselves as well as by their parents/guardians.


METHODS
This study had a longitudinal intervention design. Sixty-nine children diagnosed with ECC and 43 children without caries (combined children's mean age=50.4 months; range=22 to 70 months) and their parents/guardians responded to face-to-face administered surveys before a dental treatment was started (baseline assessment). Thirty-seven children with ECC completed dental rehabilitation. Four weeks after the treatment was completed, these 37 children as well as their parents/guardians responded to a second survey (follow-up assessment).


RESULTS
The results show that children with ECC have significantly lower oral health-related QOL than children without ECC as assessed both by the children and the parents/guardians at baseline. The children with ECC who received dental treatment had a significantly improved oral health-related QOL at the follow-up assessment when compared with their baseline measurement as measured both with the children's self-ratings of oral health-related QOL and the parents'/guardians' perception of their child's oral health-related QOL.


CONCLUSIONS
ECC and its treatment affect children's oral health-related QOL in a significant way. Oral health-related QOL can be assessed validly and reliably both in self-reports from children as young as 36 months of age as well as by asking parents/guardians about their perceptions of their child's oral health-related QOL.
Filstrup
Sara L
SL
School of Dentistry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich, USA. sarafio@msn.com
Briskie
Dan
D
da Fonseca
Marcio
M
Lawrence
Leslie
L
Wandera
Angela
A
Inglehart
Marita Rohr
MR
D000328:Adult; D001294:Attitude to Health; D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003731:Dental Caries / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy; D004955:Esthetics, Dental; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008409:Mastication; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D019727:Proxy / Q000523:psychology; D011788:Quality of Life; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D014098:Toothache / Q000523:psychology; D016896:Treatment Outcome