Association Between Socio-Behavioral Factors and Oral Health Status of 12-15 Year Old School children in Belagavi City- A Cross Sectional Study

Abstract

BackgroundOral health is a multi-factorial concept, determined by knowledge, behavior, and attitude of a person. Like any behavior carried out daily like a habit, oral health behaviors are also repeated like a habit. The multidimensionality of behavioral change makes studying it, and factors associated with it, a challenge, since there are so many aspects to consider. ObjectivesTo find an association between the oral health status and socio-behavioral factors among 12-15 years old school children of Belagavi city, India. MethodsA descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted to find an association between the oral health status and the knowledge, attitude and behavior of adolescents. One thousand participants were selected using two-stage random sampling. Dental caries, bleeding on probing, dental trauma, enamel fluorosis, intervention urgency was recorded according to the WHO 2013 proforma and the parameters regarding knowledge, attitudes as well as behavior using a closed ended self-designed questionnaire. Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal Wallis, and linear correlation tests were done. ResultsAmong 1000 subjects, 767 (76.7%) participants were found to have dental caries and 512 (51.2%) showed the presence of gingival bleeding. Out of a total score of 41, the mean knowledge score was 34.47 (±3.84) for boys and 34.76 (±4.13) for girls. Linear correlation showed that attitude was weakly correlated (r=0.18 and 0.20 respectively) but with a strong statistical significance to knowledge as well as behavior respectively. ConclusionAttitude when compared separately either with knowledge or behavior showed a weak correlation that was highly significant. Comparison of behavior with caries experience showed a weak negative correlation which was statistically insignificant. Key-wordsOral health, Adolescents, Socio-behavioral, Knowledge, Attitude, Behavior INTRODUCTION The prevalence of non-communicable diseases is significant worldwide; they represent a comprehensive burden to people and society, display large disparities across countries, disproportionately affect poor and disadvantaged population groups and they are increasing rapidly across the globe. Access this article online Quick Response Code Website: