Dental health of 5-year-olds following community-based oral health promotion in Glasgow, UK

Aim. A community development oral health promotion programme based on the principles of the Ottawa Charter was conducted in an attempt to improve the dental health of children under 5 years of age in two severely socioeconomically challenged pilot districts in Glasgow, UK. Later phased extension involved all of the area's most deprived communities. The aim of the present study was to assess dental health outcomes by secondary analysis of routine caries datasets for Glasgow 5-year-olds over the interval from 1997-1998 to 2003-2004. Design. Wilcoxon tests assessed change in d(3)mft scores and logistic regression was used to analyse binomial scores (e.g. % d(3)mft = 0). Results. After adjusting for age and deprivation (DepCat) in pilot districts 1 and 2, significant redistributions of the relative frequency of d(3)mft scores were observed (P = 0012 and P < 0.001, respectively), mean d(3)mft decreased from 5.5 to 3.6 and from 6.0 to 3.6, respectively, and the proportions with d(3)mft= 0 increased from 11% to 29% and from 10% to 32%, respectively [P = 0010, odds ratio (OR) = 0-25, and P = 0006, OR = 0.30, respectively, for d(3)mft >0]. Following extension of the programme into all of Glasgow's socioeconomically challenged areas, the mean d(3)mft values of 5-year-olds reduced in all DepCat 7 communities, and across Glasgow as a whole from 4.9 to 4.1 and from 3.5 to 3.1, respectively, while the proportion with d(3)mft = 0 increased from 20% to 32% (P < 0.001) and from 34% to 42% (P < 0.001), respectively. Conclusion. Dental health improvements were observed in pilot districts and across all DepCat 7 communities following the roll-out of the programme. This change was of sufficient magnitude to impact upon area-wide statistics for Glasgow.