Avaliação da condição de saúde bucal e fatores associados em bebês atendidos no Programa de Atenção à Primeira Infância - PAI no Município de Patos/PB.

Abstract

Introduction: Dental caries is considered a public health problem, requiring actions to resolve the consequences of this desease. Objective: to evaluate feeding practices and associeted factors in babies aged 0 to 24 months assisted by the Early Childhood Care Program in the city of Patos/Paraíba. Material and Method: The descriptive and analytical cross-sectional study was carried out with 73 pairs of babies and mothers who live in conditions of extreme social vulnerability. Data collection was carried out in two stages, which comprised: a semi-structured interview with the mothers in order to obtain information about demographic factors, of the family nucleus, oral health care, acess to dental services and infant feeding practices; and the intra-oral clinical examination to assess the oral health condition of babies. The simplified ICDAS index was adopted to acess the activity of the lesion and identify the severity of the disease (initial, moderate and severe). The statistical software SPSS® (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) version 21.0, was used to obtain relative and absolute frequencies and bivariate statistical tests (chi-square). The study was approved by CEP/ CFP/UFCG (nº 6.035.163). Results: The consumption of breast milk was a practice observed in the first months of life, being replaced by the consumption of milk thickened with a thickener. The practice of healthy eating was observed as complementary in most of the sample, however the consumption of processed/ultra-processed foods was present in the babies’ diet. Although the consumption of free sugar was observed, most babies had a low cariogenic diet. The prevalence of the desease in the studied sample was 23.8%. Conclusion: The present study found that despite social vulnerability, the prevalence of dental caries was low in the studied population, however early exposure to sugar was a frequent eating practice, supporting the need to adopt preventive measures to delay or reduce the experience of caries in early childhood.