Oral Health Status and Dental Caries Experience in Mentally Challenged Individuals

Scanning the literature reveals that in India there is little data available relating to dental health in mentally challenged. The study aims to determine prevalence of dental caries, oral health status, and periodontal needs in mentally challenged individuals of North Indian population. The cross-sectional study was conducted among patients attending a special education program at Faculty of Dentistry, JMI, and Delhi, India. DMFT Index, Simplified Oral Hygiene Index (OHI-S) and CPITN index were used to evaluate caries, oral hygiene status and periodontal needs, respectively. The chisquare test was used to compare between categorical variables. Depending on the type of disability, 258 patients were classified into five groups’ mental retardation (MR), Autistic disorder (AD), Down syndrome (DS), Cerebral palsy (CP) and other. The overall prevalence of dental caries in the study population was 76%. Among the study groups, DS exhibited highest DMFT and CPITN scores. The oral health status of the mentally disabled individuals is influenced by type of the disability.