“Dental Health” preventive program as a stage of rehabilitating children with cognitive developmental disabilities

Abstract

Relevance. One of the paramount directions of preventive dentistry is the development of the author's methods of organization and implementation of dental diseases prevention programs in children with cognitive developmental disabilities, allowing for prevention customization, taking into account the features of child development with disabilities, as well as the combination of many objective factors. The study aimed to increase the efficiency of mentally-retarded children's rehabilitation by improving the dental disease prevention program.Materials and methods. The study involved 140 children diagnosed with moderate mental retardation and comparatively analyzed two methods over three years. Group 1 included 71 subjects aged 8-11 years trained according to "Dental Health", the author's dental and hygiene education program, developed and adjusted to the psychophysical needs of the child development. Group 2 consisted of 69 subjects, trained according to the dental and hygiene education program provided only by the teachers during classes on household chores. We evaluated the effectiveness of the "Dental Health" prevention program introduced into the specialized educational process by the following indices DMFT, simplified oral hygiene index (OHI-S); PMA index modified by Parma assessed the condition of the gums. Statistical data were processed using the IBM SPSS Statistics 18.0 application sof tware package.Results. The effectiveness analysis of the author's program for children with moderate mental retardation revealed that the level of oral hygiene in the children increased from "poor" to "good" (2.1 ± 0.3 points to good 0.2 ± 0.1 points); gingival inflammation decreased from 24.6 ± 0.5% to 14.4 ± 0.2%. Classes on dental education and hygiene training helped children with cognitive developmental disabilities to orient better in self, time and place; helped to improve memory, increase vocabulary, form new knowledge and skills, and gradually form effective communication based on the child's intellectual deficiency severity.Conclusions. The developed educational program "Dental Health" for dental diseases primary prevention in children with cognitive developmental disabilities allowed the formation of stable oral care skills, proved by a good score of oral hygiene indices.