Oral health in children with Down syndrome: Parents’ views on dental care in Flanders (Belgium)

Authors:

ABSTRACT

Aim

Evaluate the views and knowledge, regarding dental care, of parents who have a child with Down syndrome (DS).

Methods

Parents of children with DS were invited to fill in a questionnaire. They were recruited by the Flemish
Organization for DS, from schools for children with special needs and by four multidisciplinary medical DS teams at four University
Hospitals. Statistics: Chi-square tests were used to test the correlation between different variables. Results were assessed in the
95 confidence interval with p<0.05.

Results

Mean age of the children was 10.1 years old (SD: 5.3). Oral health was
indicated as rather good by 53 of the parents. Of the children, 66 went to a dentist within the last six months. Most of
the children (64) received a dental examination. In 53 of the cases, parents visited the same dentist for their child with
DS as their other child(ren) without DS. Eighty-three percent of the parents are pleased with their dentist. They expect the dentist to be
kind and reassuring. Children aged 10 years or younger get significantly more help with tooth brushing (79) than children older
than 10 years (36). However 20 of the parents never received any oral hygiene instructions for their child with DS.

Conclusion

Prevention is the most frequent service provided by the dentist. Parents seem to be pleased with the dentist who treats
their child with DS.

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