National Oral Health Screening for Infants and Children: A Survey on its Perception, Requirements and Accuracy of Parents and Dentists

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate parents’ and dentists’ perceptions of the national oral health screening for infants and children (OHS), and evaluate the dentists’ accuracy of analyzing the results of OHS. A questionnaire survey was conducted, face-to-face or online, for 90 parents of children who received OHS in the Department of Pediatric Dentistry at Yonsei University Dental Hospital and 100 dentists working at local clinic or university dental hospital from May to October 2021. Most parents and dentists were aware of the importance of OHS, and approximately 96.7% of parents were satisfied with OHS. The requirements of parents and dentists about OHS were different. The reasons for having difficulties in explaining parents after OHS and the opinions on appropriate period and number of OHS were disagreed between pediatric dentists and general dentists. Regardless of dentists’ major, work experience, elapsed period after taking online education program, the accuracy of the examination result was low. In this study, various opinions of parents and dentists on OHS were collected. Efforts should be made to enhance the oral health of infants and children by considering the requirements of parents and dentists and improving the accuracy of examination results.