The Journal
Discussion
“Prevention is better than cure” as the saying
goes, has been proven to be true in different
situationsand when it comes to oral health it’s
the most suitable line describing the level of
dental care education we want to dispense to
the community. There are several ways to
reduce the occurrence of oral diseases and that
particularly can be achieved through
conducting appropriate oral health education
programmes in schools, primary health centres
and through non-profit or government
organizations. At an early age, children should
be made aware and be educated on the subject
of oral health because it would have a major
impact on their health-related behaviour later in
life as it is more feasible to modulate habits at
young age, where as in adults established
practices are difficult to modify.
Billions of children in the world of different age
groups go to schools; these become the ideal
locations for conducting educational
programmes. 85% of the population in
Himachal Pradesh resides in rural areas of
which more than 35% constitute children. This
population is untouched by any preventive and
educational dental health programmes,
expressing poor knowledge about oral health
practices and awareness.
usually by ingestion. Once fluorosis occurs it is
irreversible without any cure. Only symptomatic
and supportive management is possible.
According to the Research Done by Central
Ground Water Board, Ministry Of Water
Resources And Government Of India On
‘Ground Water Scenario In Himalayan Region’,
India, Fluoride pollution is observed in spring
water of Himachal Pradesh ranging from 1-
4mg/l which is above the accepted fluoride
levels in drinking water – 1.5mg/l7.
In the present study, out of 3024 children
checked, 790 males and 570 females have
good oral hygiene and 902 males and 762
females needed treatment. The percentage of
children requiring treatment was as high as
55% when we had expected while screening
the school children to be around 25-35%.
(Table 1)
According to this study (Table 2) the p value
comes to 0.032 which is significant and proves
that the children requiring treatment for caries is
higher than those having good oral hygiene.
In many places highfluorides are naturally
present in earth crust leading to
highwaterfluoridecontent increasing the risk of
fluorosis.Maintaining a fine balance of fluorides
in the body is mandatory for exploiting its
advantages. World Health Organization (WHO)
has fixed permissible limit of fluorides in water
to 1.5 mg/L as a preventive step to contain
fluorosis.Fluorosis has three clinical
components: Dental, Skeletal and Non-Skeletal
Fluorosis. It occurs with increasing level of
fluorides in the body. Acute toxicity due to
fluorides is also known and occurs as a result of
sudden exposure to high levels of fluorides,
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Vol. 14 No. 1
Jan-Apr 2018