Oral Health Attitude, Knowledge and Practice among 8-14 Years Old, School Going Children in Shopian, Jammu & Kashmir, India

Dr Shakir Hussain Rather, Dr Abhaya Agarwal, Dr Neeraj Kant Panwar, Dr Neeraj Solanki, Dr Himanshu Tomar, Dr Pema Tshering Lepcha

Abstract: Aim: To Assess the Oral health Attitude, Knowledge and Practice among 8-14 years old, School Going children in Shopian, Jammu & Kashmir, India. Materials and Methods: The subjects for this study were randomly selected from five private and five government schools in the age group of 8-14 years. A total of 500 children were selected both males and females through Cluster sampling, with age group of 8 to 14 years Government and Private school going children both male and female had been selected. Self structured questionnaire was used. The questionnaire includes 10 questions without names and is used to evaluate oral health status, knowledge, attitudes and practice among school going children. Results: Overall the level of knowledge score was statistically significant with P = 0.001. There was statistically significant difference with P = 0.001 Data collected from school going children regarding method of cleaning teeth, type and frequency of brushing teeth, timing of brushing, parental supervision during brushing, gum bleeding during brushing, method employed when gums bleed, frequency of visit to the dentist, treatment done during last visit to the dentist, reason for last visit to the dentist and reason for not visiting the dentist. When comparing it was observed that statistically significant difference with P < 0.001) was found. Conclusion: The overall level of oral health knowledge among the surveyed children was low.

Keywords: Attitude, knowledge, oral health, practice, school children