Evaluation of International Caries Detection and Assessment System (ICDAS)-related caries severity among caries risk groups in Pendul district: An observational study

Aim: The aim of this study was to evaluate the difference in severity of caries code 5 or 6 according to the International Caries Detection and Assessment System (ICDAS) among caries risk groups in Pendul district. Materials and Methods: This was an observational study with a cross-sectional design. A total of 730 people who were residing in Pendul district belonged to population of this study. One of the inclusion criteria of this study was the people who were >= 5 years old according to World Health Organization. On the basis of our preliminary survey, we confirmed 660 people who fulfilled the inclusion criteria. The subjects were selected using the accidental simple random sampling. Slovin's formula was used with margin of error 8% to obtain the 138 subjected people. Of the 138 subjects studied, there were only 87 people who could be included in the further inclusion criteria by having dental caries code 5 or 6 according to ICDAS. The Kruskal-Wallis statistical test was used to analyze the differences as the data belong to nonparametric and there were three variable groups. Next, the Mann-Whitney U was used to test the differences between these variables. Results: The results of this study showed that there was a significant difference in the severity of caries among caries risk groups (P < 0.05). Conclusion: The higher the caries risk the higher the caries severity that was observed. This result supported the potential use of caries risk assessment as a predictive and supportive tool to prevent the increasing caries severity in the community.