Comparison of the effectiveness of two educational methods including lecturing and presenting pamphlets to parents about the observance of oral hygiene habits of preschool children on oral health in Shabestar city

Abstract

Dental caries is a silent epidemic related to public health and needs special attention. Despite the relative improvement of the oral and dental health situation in the world, the problems caused by it remain strong in both developed and developing countries. So far, there has been no intervention in order to compare the effectiveness of the two educational methods including lecturing and presenting pamphlets to parents. The purpose of the present study, is Comparison of the effectiveness of two educational methods including lecturing and presenting pamphlets to parents about the observance of oral hygiene habits of pre-school children on oral health in Shabestar city.

Materials and methods: This clinical trial study was conducted on 40 pre-school children of Shebster city and their parents. In order to do this, the simplified oral hygiene index (OHI-s) of these people was measured, then these people were randomly divided into two groups of 20 people. The first group received training on oral hygiene habits through lecturing and the second group received this training through the presenting of pamphlets. Finally, after 6 weeks the simplified oral hygiene index of all children was re-evaluated.

Findings: 70% (28 people) of the parents were male and 30% (12 people) were female. 55% (22 people) had a diploma education and 45% (18 people) had a bachelor's education. The average of Debris index for both lecturing and presenting pamphlet groups at the end of the study compared to the beginning decreased significantly (p-value <0.001), But this reduction was not significant between the two groups (p-value=0.772). The average of Calculus index for both lecturing and presenting pamphlet groups decreased significantly at the end of the study compared to the beginning (p-value <0.001), But this reduction was not significant between the two groups (p-value=0.563). Finally, the average of OHI-s for both lecturing and presenting pamphlet groups decreased significantly at the end of the study compared to the beginning (p-value <0.001), But this reduction was not significant between the two groups (p-value=0.907).

Results: This interventional study showed that the training of parents by both lecturing and presenting pamphlet methods was effective and the reduction of Debris, Calculus and finally the OHI-s indexes was observed. On the other hand, these reductions were not significant between the two groups and no significant difference was observed between the results of the two types of training.