거제시 수돗물불소농도조정사업 6년 경과 후의 영구치우식 예방효과

The caries preventive effect on permanent teeth adjusted for number of fissure-sealed teeth and surfaces from 6-year community water fluoridation program in Geoje City

Objectives: The water fluoridation program has been implemented since 2008, in a region of Geoje City. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of the water fluoridation program on caries prevention in the permanent dentition. Methods: Evaluation surveys were conducted on 8-, 10- and 12-year-old children in the fluoridated and non-fluoridated regions of Geoje City, in 2015. The survey included 834 children from the fluoridated regions and 703 from the non-fluoridated regions. The data obtained from the survey were analyzed using the IBM SPSS statistical package version 23.0. The effectiveness of community water fluoridation in caries prevention was estimated by the differences in the decayed, missing, filled teeth (DMFT) and decayed, missing, filled surfaces (DMFS) scores, between the program and control groups. The mean numbers of fissure-sealed teeth and surfaces were adjusted to reduce their confounding effect. Results: The mean DMFT and DMFS scores (0.69 and 0.91, respectively) of 10-year-olds from the fluoridated regions, after adjusting for the numbers of fissure-sealed teeth and surfaces, were significantly lower than those of the 10 year olds (DMFT: 0.95, DMFS: 1.32) from the non-fluoridated regions. The effectiveness of water fluoridation on caries prevention in the permanent dentition, estimated based on the differences in the mean DMFT and DMFS scores, adjusted for the number of fissure-sealed teeth and surfaces, between the program and control groups of 10-year-old children, was 27.4% and 31.1%, respectively. Conclusions: These results suggest that the effectiveness of water fluoridation on caries prevention in the permanent dentition, in Geoje City was so high that this program should be implemented in other regions in Korea as well.