CARIES RISK ASSESSMENT USING CARIOGRAM IN INDIVIDUALS VISITING DENTAL INSTITUTION: RETROSPECTIVE STUDY

Abstract

Dental caries is a multifactorial disease. Caries risk assessment is a process of establishing probability for an individual towards the risk of caries development in future. The models for caries risk assessment contain a combination of factors such as diet, fluoride exposure,a susceptible host, microflora that interact with the variety of social, cultural and behavioural factors. The aim of the study is to evaluate the caries risk assessment using cariogram in patients visiting dental institutions. This was a retrospective institutional study. Samples were collected from June 2019 to March 2020 from patient records who visited a private dental hospital. Sample size was 135. Details on plaque score and cariogram factors were collected from patient records and tabulated in microsoft excel tabulation and analyzed using SPSS. p<0.05 was considered significant. Statistically significant correlations were found between the DMFT and diet frequency p=0.00. The mean DMFT score was found to be 7.62 in male and 7.91 in females, mean percentage of avoiding new cavities was found to be 46.2400 in male and 41.0333 in female, mean of circumstances was found to be 11.2933 in males and 12.8833 in females, mean of bacteria was found to be 15.9867 in males and 16.4167 in females, mean of susceptibility was found to be 17.9200 in males and 19.8833 in females, mean of diet was found to be 8.5733 in males, 9.7167 in females. There was no association between gender and DMFT score p>0.05, cariogram categories(p>0.05). Statistical significance was seen in correlation between DMFT and diet (p=0.001) while there was no correlation between the remaining cariogram parameters and DMFT. Within the limitations of the present study, we can conclude that, in our population the most important risk factor for caries development was diet frequency.