Association between Oral Health Literacy of Mothers with Child who has Epilepsy and the Children s Oral Health

Aims Children with epilepsy are exposed to oral disease due to the lack of self-care and antiepileptic medicines’ side effects. The present study aimed to assess the association between mothers’ oral health literacy with a child who has epilepsy and the children’s oral health status. Materials Methods This cross-sectional study was performed during the fall and winter of 2017 in Ahvaz, Iran. Mothers of one-hundred 3-6 years’ children with epilepsy referred to Golestan hospital were selected through the available sampling method and completed a valid and reliable questionnaire on oral health literacy. The children’s oral and dental health was also examined by a dentist to determine decayed, missed, and filled teeth and simplified oral hygiene index. ANOVA and Pearson correlations were used to analyze data in SPSS 15. Findings The mean age of mothers, OHI-S index, and the average number of decayed teeth in children were 30.28±4.3, 2.75±0.75, and 2.86±1.65, respectively. Besides, the mean numbers of extracted and filled teeth of children were respectively 0.31±0.48 and 0.19±0.41. A significant relationship was seen between the mother’s education and the simplified oral hygiene index. Also, there was a significant relationship between mothers’ oral health literacy and decayed, missed, and filled teeth (p 0.005). Moreover, no statistically significant relationship was observed between mothers’ oral health literacy and simplified oral hygiene index score (p 0.05). Conclusion The present study showed an association between maternal Oral Health Literacy and children’s oral health with epilepsy.