A Randomized Controlled Trial for Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Oral Irrigator and Interdental Floss for Plaque Control in Children with Visual Impairment

JOURNAL TITLE: International Journal of Clinical Pediatric Dentistry

Author
1. A Ratnaditya
2. Vajrala Deepika
ISSN
0974-7052
DOI
10.5005/jp-journals-10005-2404
Volume
15
Issue
4
Publishing Year
2022
Pages
5
Author Affiliations
    1. Department of Pedodontics and Preventive Dentistry, Vishnu Dental College, Bhimavaram, Andhra Pradesh, India
    1. Department of Pedodontics and Preventive Dentistry, Vishnu Dental College, Bhimavaram, Andhra Pradesh, India
  • Article keywords
    Interdental floss, Oral hygiene, Oral irrigator, Randomized controlled trial, Visual impairment

    Abstract

    Aim: To evaluate the effectiveness of oral irrigator and interdental floss as adjuncts to manual tooth brushing in 8–16 years old children with visual impairment. Materials and methods: A three-arm, parallel-group randomized controlled trial with blinded outcome assessment was carried out with the inclusion of 90 institutionalized children with visual impairment of age 8–16 years. They were equally allocated to three groups: group I: tooth brushing along with interdental flossing, group II: brushing along with a powered oral irrigator, and group III: brushing alone (control). Baseline oral hygiene index-simplified (OHI-S), gingival index (GI), and plaque index (PI) scores were recorded for all the samples and compared with post-intervention scores at 14 and 28 days intervals. Repeated measures of analysis of variance (ANOVA), one-way ANOVA, and post hoc Tukey tests were used for statistical analysis. Results: At 28 days interval, children in group II showed a highly statistically significant reduction in OHI-S (0.46; p = 0.0001), PI (0.16; p = 0.0001), and GI (0.24; p = 0.0001) scores compared to control group. They also showed a significant reduction in OHI-S (0.25; p = 0.018), PI (0.15; p = 0.011), and GI (0.15; p = 0.0001) scores compared to group I. There is no significant reduction in the scores of children of group I compared to control group except for the GI score (0.08; p = 0.02). Conclusion: Oral hygiene maintenance using oral irrigator along with brushing was found to be more effective in visually challenged children. Interdental flossing, along with brushing and brushing alone was found to be less effective. Clinical significance: This study underlines the fact that comprehensive oral hygiene care should include interdental cleaning aids for effective plaque control to prevent dental diseases in children with visual impairment. Since these children have less manual dexterity to perform good oral hygiene practices, electrically driven interdental cleaning aids like oral irrigator may help them to overcome the problem.

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