Sanjana Sudarshan
King’s College London, United Kingdom
Title: Audit on recall intervals of high risk children at Wedgwood house dental practice
Biography
Biography: Sanjana Sudarshan
Abstract
Child caries is a significant issue in our population, in both permanent and deciduous dentition, with at least a third of children across all age groups having caries into dentine. The benefits of frequent oral health reviews are numerous including early detection and enhanced prevention. This is of increased importance for children possessing high caries risk factors such poor plaque control, highly cariogenic diets or children with previous or existing carious lesions. This audit uses retrospective data collection to assess whether appropriate recall intervals are being assigned to high risk paediatric patients at Wedgwood House Dental Practice in accordance to the guidance provided by National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE). The first 50 high risk patients under the age of 18 attending for an Oral Health Assessment or Oral Health Review were included in the study sample. The results of the first cycle of the audit showed that only 32% of high risk children were given the appropriate recall interval of 3 months. Furthermore, it was shown that only 56% of high risk children were assessed and assigned the correct risk status. Therefore, interventions to increase the adherence to guidelines were put in place: teaching and training for staff; posters displayed in key locations throughout the practice; handouts of guidance literature; and encouraging dentists to add a reminder of the correct recalls to their proformas. Time was allowed for the interventions to take effect and the audit was repeated using same methodology as previously. The second cycle of audit results collected showed that now 96% of children were being correctly assessed and 60% of these high risk children were now correctly being recalled at 3 months. This shows an 87% increase in correct recall intervals being assigned to high risk children, thus highlighting the positive impact of the interventions.
Key words: Paediatric, caries, risk assessment, oral health review, recall intervals, prevention.