Exploring Parental Knowledge and Indigenous Practices for Infant Teething in Indian Population: A Cross-sectional Study

Global prevalence of teething problems in infants and children-A systematic review and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND

Eruption of primary teeth is associated with local and systemic manifestations. Understanding the global prevalence is necessary to formulate the standard guidelines for management.

AIM

To evaluate the global prevalence of problems associated with teething in infants and children aged 0-36 months.

DESIGN

PubMed, LILACS, Web of Science, Scopus, and EMBASE were searched on May 31, 2023, and it was updated on January 31, 2024. Gray literature and reference search were performed. Cross-sectional, case-control, and cohort studies done in hospital or community settings, reporting the prevalence of signs and symptoms during the eruption of primary teeth in infants aged 0-36 months, were included. Two reviewers extracted data using a pre-piloted sheet. Data were analyzed and pooled by using random-effects meta-analyses.

RESULTS

Twenty-five studies were included. The global prevalence of teething problems was 80.0% (95% confidence interval [CI]: 67.8-89.9). The most common local symptom was increased biting (65.9%, 95% CI 37.5-89.3), and irritability (60.7%, 95% CI 50.6-70.3) was the most common general symptom.

CONCLUSION

The pooled prevalence of teething problems was estimated to be 80%. There was a variability in the prevalence of teething problems based on geographic location.

Knowledge and management practices of infant teething symptoms among mothers in a tertiary facility in Ghana

Introduction

teething is a natural process that all infants go through, and most toddlers obtain their first tooth around six months. However, misconceptions about teething and its remedies are still prevalent. The study assessed the knowledge and management practices of infant teething symptoms among mothers whose children were admitted to the Pediatric ward of Tamale Teaching Hospital.

Methods

the study adopted a prospective descriptive cross-sectional design with a quantitative data collection method. A total of 251 mothers were selected using a convenient sampling strategy, and a structured questionnaire was used for data collection.

Results

the study found that 79.7% and 20.3% of respondents had good and poor knowledge of teething, respectively. Also, 65.3% and 34.7% of the mothers had good and poor practices, respectively, in the management of teething symptoms. Marital status (p= 0.029) and type of ward (p= 0.020) were significantly associated with mothers' knowledge of teething. Furthermore, mothers less than 30 years of age (OR, 2.07; 95% CI: 1.19-3.57; p= 0.009) and mothers with formal education (OR, 2.22; 95% CI: 1.22-3.81; p= 0.004) were more likely to have good management practices for teething symptoms.

Conclusion

most mothers have a good understanding of child teething, but they do not think delayed eruptions indicate systemic disease. They identified taking the child to the hospital during teething symptoms and administering Paracetamol to relieve the symptoms as standard practices. However, more education is needed to differentiate between teething signs and other ailments and to prevent substandard first aid practices during teething.

Parental beliefs in and attitudes toward teething signs and symptoms: A systematic review

BACKGROUND

Parents believe that teething is associated with signs and symptoms, which may induce them to give medications that could harm their children. Some children may require alleviation of symptoms and overall attention.

AIM

To assess parents' beliefs in and attitudes toward teething.

DESIGN

Through electronic databases and gray literature, this systematic review identified cross-sectional studies reporting parents' beliefs in, knowledge about, and attitudes toward the signs and symptoms of primary tooth eruption in children aged between 0 and 36 months. Three reviewers independently selected the studies, collected the information, assessed methodological quality, and checked for accuracy with disagreements solved by a fourth reviewer. The Agency of Research and Quality in Health questionnaire for cross-sectional studies was used for quality assessment. Descriptive analysis with median and interquartile ranges was adopted.

RESULTS

Twenty-nine studies comprising 10 524 participants from all geographic regions were included. The methodological quality of the studies was moderate. Most parents have beliefs in signs and symptoms during dentition, the most reported symptom being the desire to bite. Oral rehydration was the most exposed attitude in the studies included. Only a small proportion of parents reported no attitude.

CONCLUSIONS

The majority of parents believed in at least one sign or symptom associated with teething, and only few of them would do nothing or just wait for the signs or symptoms to pass, with no difference among countries (Protocol doi: 10.17605/OSF.IO/S2KZ3).

Rural-urban disparities in knowledge, attitude, and practice toward child oral health among mothers of 9-36-month-old children

Objective: To assess and compare the knowledge, attitude, and practice of mothers of pre-school children in urban and rural areas toward maintaining child oral health. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional comparative study was conducted in a convenient sample of 400 mothers of pre-school children (aged 9 months to 3 years) visiting the outpatient department of the Department of Dentistry, Shyam Shah Medical College, Rewa (M.P), India between February 1 and April 21, 2022. The study sample was divided into two groups based on whether they belonged to a rural area (Group A) or urban area (Group B). Group A included 236 participants, and Group B 186 participants. They were served a 24-item questionnaire to assess and compare their knowledge, attitude, and practice toward child oral health. The data were represented as mean and proportions, and a student t test and analysis of variance were performed. Results: In Group A and Group B, 93.64% and 98.17% mothers respectively had the knowledge of cariogenic food. While 66.10% of mothers in Group A and 73.78% in Group B were aware that regular cleaning of teeth protects against tooth decay, only 5.49% of mothers in Group B and none in Group A reported taking their children to routine dental visits; the majority (94.07% in Group A and 78.05% in Group B) had never taken their children to the dentist. Urban background was significantly associated with better knowledge, attitude, and practice scores. Mother's' age and education level were significantly associated with better Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice scores in both groups. Conclusion: Mothers can play an important role in promoting positive attitudes and healthy practices toward oral health care in children. Knowledge, attitude, and practice score were found to be significantly low in mothers who belonged to the rural subgroup.

Levels and correlates of knowledge of teething among Saudi Arabian families

Background

Parental knowledge of teething has been repeatedly investigated; however, little emphasis has been made on the associated sociodemographic factors with good knowledge of the parents and whether or not good knowledge is translated into adopting proper pain-relieving practices. The present study aims to firstly assess the knowledge level and practices of Saudi parents regarding teething and then explore associated sociodemographic variables with good knowledge of teething to determine the relation between parents' knowledge of teething and their adoption of pain-relieving practices.

Methods

This cross-sectional study recruited parents from the social networking sites Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and WhatsApp, and they were asked to answer a pretested three-part internationally accepted questionnaire. Data were examined using descriptive statistics, chi-square analysis, multivariate logistic regression analysis, and Spearman rank-order correlation coefficient analysis.

Results

One thousand four hundred ninety-nine parents responded and returned completed questionnaires. Of those, only 11.2% had good knowledge of teething. The majority of parents did not have basic knowledge of the teething period as well as believed that teething was associated with a runny nose (87.5%), diarrhea (77.9%), and sleep disturbance (72%). The results of multivariate logistic regression analysis indicated that parents with no primary school education (Odds Ratio: 0.29), or those who had an intermediate or secondary education level (OR: 0.55 and 0.78) were less likely to have good knowledge compared with parents who had a university degree. However, parents who earned intermediate monthly income (OR: 6.63) were more likely to have good knowledge of teething. With regards to practices used to relieve teething pain, inappropriate practices were observed regarding bottle feeding at night to soothe the child's pain (72%) and applying topical analgesics to rub the gum (72.4%). A significant positive correlation was found between the knowledge score and the practice score of both fathers and mothers (r = 0.22 and 0.13, p < 0.0001).

Conclusion

A very low percentage of Saudi parents, mainly those with the highest education level and intermediate monthly income, had good knowledge of teething, which translated into appropriate practices to soothe the child's pain regardless of the parent's gender. Saudi parents should receive anticipatory guidance related to teething from all health professionals to ensure an uneventful teething period for their children.