Community-Based Prevention for an Indigenous Village in MALAYSIA

Objectives: Kampung Sebir is a rural village in Malaysia inhabited by around 200 indigenous people, mainly the Temuan tribe. A community oral health project was conducted with the objective of determining the oral health status, delivering oral health education, improving the dental hygiene skills of the villagers and deliver necessary treatment to the villagers while guiding them to adopt healthy oral habits.
Methods: Data collection was done via door-to-door visits using the WHO oral health questionnaires for adults and children. Oral health talks with live demonstration of the right tooth-brushing technique, and educational game booths were set up to facilitate children-learning and treatments were delivered as deemed required. Topical Fluoride ( Duraphat, 22600 ppm) was applied for individuals with high caries risk. Treatments such as caries excavation was done for villagers with active caries and restored with provisional restorations (Cavit); while severely decayed, unrestorable teeth were extracted. Manual scaling was done for plaque and calculus removal. Qualitative interviews were conducted on the villagers in the form of post intervention videos to assess their perception of the interventions provided.
Results: Based on results collected from the questionnaires, it is suggested that there are villagers whom were unaware about the state of their teeth (30.8%) and gums (46.2%). Some did not even know how often they cleaned their teeth (61.5%) and 85% of the adults had decayed teeth. A total of 27 people participated in the questionnaires; 17 villagers attended the oral health talk; while 22 villagers received dental treatment.
Conclusions: In conclusion, a long term intervention focusing on self-empowerment of the villagers to take responsibility of their own well-being is the best way to ensure a long standing success and improving their quality of life.