School-based Caries Prevention Fluoride-programs in a Danish Low Socio-economic Area

Objectives: Objective: In the Danish public dental clinics, professional fluoride programs are offered to children with high caries risk as an adjunct to tooth brushing with fluoride toothpaste.The objective of this observational field study was to investigate the effect of two different school-based fluoride programs.
Methods: Methods: The study was conducted in at low socio-economic, immigrant surbuban area in Odense, Denmark, with 5 times higher DMFS values than the city average. 718 children (aged 6-12 years) were enrolled after informed consent and their class unit was randomly allocated to one of the two fluoride programs. One group received semi-ammual fluoride varnish applications (5%, FV) and the other group had weekly supervised fluoride mouth rinses (0.1%, FMR). All children received individual oral hygiene instructions and general dental care at the public clinics during the study period (2 years). The primary outcome was the DMFS increment and increment of initial lesions. Data were compared by Student’s t-test using SPSS software.
Results: Results: At the two year follow-up 608 children were available for examination (15% dropout rate). There were no statistical significant differences between the mean DMFS in the two groups, neither at baseline nor at the follow up. The FV group showed an DMFS increment of 0.84 compared to 0.65 in the FMR group. Regarding initial caries lesions, the test group had an increment of 0.78 compared to 1.1 in the control group. There were no statistical significant differences between the increments in the two groups.
Conclusions: Conclusion: The effect of the two fluoride programs was similar when offered to a population with high caries prevalence.