Oral, otorhinolaryngologic and ophthalmic health status of children in a Nigeria rural community

Abstract

Background: Good vision, adequate hearing, speech and optimal oral health are essential parts of children's health, and these may negatively impact the academic performance of the children if adequate attention is not given.

Objective: To determine the prevalence of oral, otorhinolaryngologic and ophthalmic health of children of primary  school age in this study location

Methods: This was a cross-sectional study involving primary school children in selected public and private schools in  Ikenne Local Government area, Ogun State, Nigeria. Ethical clearance was obtained from the Babcock University Health  Research Ethics Committee. Informed consent was distributed through all the children to their parents/legal guardians.  All children who returned signed informed consent by their legal guardians were enrolled in the study. Oral, eye and  otorhinolaryngological examinations were carried out by the investigators. Data were analyzed using STATA (Stata/MP  13), descriptive analysis was done for all the discrete variables, and P value was set at P> 0.05.

Results: A total of 465  children participated in the study; the mean age of the study participants was 9.34 ±2.28 years. Only 9.7% of the study  participants had good oral hygiene, 32.3% had gingivitis, and 22.2% had dental caries. Over 20% of the children had one  form of ophthalmic condition, with conjunctivitis and optic disc abnormality accounting for the highest ophthalmic findings. In addition, 40.0% had aural wax, 11.6% had allergic rhinitis, and 2.6% had Chronic Suppurative Otitis Media  (CSOM).

Conclusion: This study showed that the majority of the children in these rural communities had poor oral  health, poor otorhinolaryngology health and fair ophthalmic health.