Family Physicians and Primary Care Providers’ Confidence in Early Childhood Caries Diagnosis and Prevention Counselling and the Associating Factors

Background: Primary care providers (PCP) and family physicians are in more frequent contact with children rather than dentists, therefore, it would be efficient to engage them in oral health promotion programs. Our aim was to evaluate primary care providers and the physicians’ self-reported confidence in Early Childhood Caries (ECC) diagnosis and prevention counselling for parents.

Methods: In this cross-sectional study, we sent a self-administered questionnaire to all PCPs (n=680) and physician (n=220) via administrational District Health Centers. The questionnaire consisted of participants’ knowledge, their self confidence in diagnosing ECC and consulting parents to prevent caries, their oral health behavior (OHB) and their background factors. Statistical analysis was done by logistic Regression Models.

Results: The mean age of the physicians was 39 (±8/0) and PNPs was 37 (±8/0). The OHB score of the physicians was 19/9 (±2/7) and of the PNPs was 19/7 (±2/5). The knowledge scores of the physicians was 18/2 (±4/5) and it was 17/2 (±4/5) in PNPs from a total of 34.

Among the study population 34% of physicians and 27% of the PNPs were confident in ECC diagnosis. These figures were 32% and 34% for providing the parents with oral health counselling.

Conclusion: Our study revealed primary care providers’ and physicians’ lack of knowledge in ECC prevention, and consequently their lack of confidence in this field. These findings point to an essential need for appropriate oral health care training for this group of professionals to help in oral health promotion of children.