Prevalence of Caries among School Children in Saudi Arabia: A Meta-Analysis

Tasneem R Adam; Abdullah I Al-Sharif; Aretas Tonouhewa; Abdulaziz A AlKheraif

doi:10.1155/2022/7132681

Prevalence of Caries among School Children in Saudi Arabia: A Meta-Analysis

Adv Prev Med. 2022 Sep 5:2022:7132681. doi: 10.1155/2022/7132681. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Tasneem R Adam¹, Abdullah I Al-Sharif¹, Aretas Tonouhewa², Abdulaziz A AlKheraif³

Affiliations

¹ Alfaisal University, College of Medicine, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
² Research Unit on Communicable Diseases, Abomey-calavi University, 01 BP 2009, Cotonou, Benin.
³ Dental Biomaterials Research Chair, Dental Health Department, College of Applied Medical Sciences, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Abstract

Introduction: Children's dental health has become the primary concern, because of the increase in the prevalence of caries amongst school children in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, a meta-analysis was conducted to assess the prevalence and severity of dental caries among school children in Saudi Arabia.

Method: A systematic search of Scopus, ISI Web of Science, EMBASE, Saudi digital library, Google Scholar, and MEDLINE via Ovid for cross-sectional studies with healthy participants between 5and -15 years. Two authors independently extracted the prevalence of caries. With 95% confidence intervals (CIs) using a random-effects model, we calculated caries prevalence.

Results: Dental caries prevalence data were extracted from 18 cross-sectional studies (n = 56,327 children). The pooled estimate for the caries prevalence among 5-7 years' children was 84% (95% CI: 0.81-0.87%; I² = 91%) while among 12-15 years' children was 72% (95% CI: 0.63-0.79; I ² = 96.2%). Discussion. In this systematic review, the summary estimate of the prevalence of dental caries among children of 5-7 years and 12-15 years were 84% and 72%, respectively. Further research is required to identify approaches for preventing and treating dental caries in schoolchildren.

Publication types

Review