Children's Oral Condition and School Dental Health Program in Tonga

Objectives: The Kingdom of Tonga is located in the South Pacific and consists of about 170 islands in four archipelago. The number of local dentists is about eight for a population of 110.000. The Dental Department of Ministry of Health in Tonga has proceeded with the dental health program (brushing and fluoride-mouth-rinsing) in some primary schools on the main land of Tongatapu and Ha'apai group with aid of the South Pacific Medical Team, Japanese NGO. The surveys were conducted to know an accurate picture of the state of caries in Tongan children, especially in intact Vava'u group where a Japanese volunteer dentist.assigned to work for two years from 2007 to 2009.

Methods: In the first survey, dental examinations based on WHO criteria was performed on 2502 5-year-old children in all primary schools in Tonga. The second one was involved 2504 5- to 10 year-old children attending 32 primary schools in Vava'u group.

Results: In the first survey, the rate of caries experience (dmft>0) of 5-year-old children of all Tonga was 89%. That of Vava'u group was 95% and highest comparing among locations. In the second survey, the dental caries prevalence of 5- to 10-year-old children in Vava'u was 97%. The numbers of surveyed children were 415,406,403,369,399 and 513 in the 5-,6-,7-,8-,9-, and 10-year-old groups respectively; the mean dmft values of the age groups were 8.3, 7.9, 6.7, 4.8, 3.7 and 2.5 respectively, with mean DMFT values of 0.5, 1.6, 2.8, 3.4, 4.1 and 5.1 respectively. Among the teeth with caries experience, 11% of the deciduous teeth and 2 % of permanent teeth had dental treatments in the past.

Conclusion: These preliminary data reveal a prevalence of dental caries among the children in Vava'u is high and it is important to promote oral health care strategies for school children.