Prevalence of oral habits in children

Abstract

Objective: this quantitative descriptive study aimed to evaluate the presence of deleterious oral habits and associated factors in children attending the Amadeu Barros Leal day care in Fortaleza, CE, Brazil. Material and Methods: the sample consisted of 75 children (51% of girls) aged 0 to 5 years. Data were collected through the application of a structured questionnaire to the parents or guardians and analyzed statistically with Fisher’s exact or Chi-square test, considering a 95% confidence interval. The results were expressed as absolute frequency and percentage. Results: 89% of the children participating in the study were breastfed, and 43.5% of them were breastfed at least until the first year of age. As much as 19% of the children slept with their mouths open and 39% used a pacifier, 56.7% of which used it constantly during the day and at night. About 91% of children used a feeding bottle, and most of bottles (79%) did not have an orthodontic nipple. In addition, 60% of children aged 24-36 months had the deleterious habit of grinding their teeth. Conclusion: in the present study, we investigated children from 0 to 5 years old and observed that this age group is predisposed to deleterious oral habits. In this way, more studies that trace a safe epidemiological profile aiming to reduce these harmful habits are extremely necessary.