Document Type : Research Article
Abstract
Fluoride is a double edged sword. It possesses cariostatic property and can also cause developmental disturbances. Cariostatic effects prevent the carious decay, increasing the mineral solubility and remineralization. But with higher doses it manifests as dental fluorosis. enamel hypo mineralization manifests as mild white lesions, Pitting forming horizontal lines or large pigmented (brown to black) defects. There must be an equilibrium between the caries prevention and fluoride contribution to enamel pathology. The main aim of the study is to estimate the prevalence of dental fluorosis and to estimate the severity of fluorosis based on Dean’s fluorosis index. This is a record based study with a sample size of 210, irrespective of the gender. The study was conducted at the institution and the data was collected from the patient records. The data was categorised into age groups, gender and Dean’s fluorosis index. The coding was done in MS excel. The data was transferred to a host computer and processed using SPSS software version 21.0 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA) by tabulation and graphical illustration. Descriptive statistics was used to study the data collected and to analyse frequency distribution. The results showed that prevalence of Dental Fluorosis is highest in the 21- 30 years age group (64%). 70% of the population were males. The severity of the fluorosis was predominantly moderate (33%) among the overall population, 2% of the population had questionable form of fluorosis, 22% reported with very mild forms of fluorosis, 27% had mild forms of the fluorosis and only 16% had severe manifestations of the disease. The prevalence of fluorosis was not associated with the age and gender of the patient (p value>0.05)
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