title: Special Olympics: the oral health status of U.S. athletes compared with international athletes.
abstract: The Healthy Athletes Special Smiles Program provides oral health screening and data collection for athletes with mental retardation who are participating in Special Olympic events. Recently, data regarding international athletes have become available for the first time, allowing a comparison against data collected in the United States. The international athletes from the countries of China, Lebanon, Poland, South Africa, and Turkey were generally younger than those of the United States (mean age 17.4 versus 24.0 years) and were more likely to be males (64.3 versus 54.6%). The international athletes were more likely to have untreated caries (50.1 versus 28.2%), and less likely to have restorations (19.6 versus 62.9%), sealants (1.8 versus 13.5%), fluorosis (3.5 versus 8.8%), signs of gingival disease (27.8 versus 40.1%), or to be edentulous (0.1 versus 3.7%). These relationships persisted after adjustment for sex and age differences between the populations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Promotion and Policy, University of Maryland Dental School, 666 West Baltimore Street, Baltimore, MD 20201, USA. BCR001@dental.umaryland.edu
authors.forename: Britt C
authors.initials: BC
authors.lastname: Reid
authors.forename: Ronald
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Chenette
authors.forename: Mark D
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: Macek
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D002681:China / Q000453:epidemiology; D004245:DMF Index; D003730:Dental Care for Persons with Disabilities; D003731:Dental Caries / Q000453:epidemiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007861:Lebanon / Q000453:epidemiology; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D009059:Mouth Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology*; D009909:Oral Health; D009910:Oral Hygiene / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D019989:Persons with Intellectual Disabilities / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011044:Poland / Q000453:epidemiology; D013019:South Africa / Q000453:epidemiology; D013177:Sports; D014421:Turkey / Q000453:epidemiology; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology