Pattern of Presentation, Reason for Presentation and Treatment of Paediatric Dental Patients at the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital: A Three-Year Review

Background: Dental attendance is regarded as one of the essential pointers to oral health education and awareness. Dental visit of children is often dependent on factors related to the parent's/caregivers’ health-seeking behaviour. Routine dental attendance has been shown to be associated with better oral health care.

Objective: To assess the pattern of presentation, the reason for presentation and the treatment of paediatric dental patients at a tertiary institution in Nigeria.

Methodology: It was a retrospective study which involved data retrieval from the patient’s record books from July 2018 to June 2021. Data on age, gender, presenting complaint, impression/diagnosis and treatment were collected from the dental records and analysed using IBM SPSS statistics version 22.

Result: Out of 6645 records, complete data of 329(5%) children were used for the study. Children within the age range of 6-12 years old were in the majority, 203(61.7%). Female children attended more 179 (54.4%) compared to the males 150 (45.6%). Pain was the major reason for dental attendance (41%) and the commonest diagnosis made was sequelae of dental caries 93 (23.4%). The treatment offered most was tooth extraction 124 (37.7%), while the least was apexogenesis 2 (0.6%). The relationship between age and sequelae of dental caries was statistically significant.

Conclusion: Children within the mixed dentition stage attended the clinic more as a result of complications of dental caries. Pain was the major complaint and the majority of the children lost their teeth because they presented late.