Asthma Dental patient - Free Essay Example

Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease characterizedby airway hyper responsiveness and revisable airflow obstruction. An approximately 300 million people worldwide have been diagnosed with asthma and there may be an additional 100 million diagnosis by 2025 (pg. 7). Moreover, with all the upspring of new cases of asthma researchers have found that environmental factors are also a contributor, depending on where an individual may live the water they drink the air they inhale all effect their oral health and the etiology of asthma. In addition to the regular effectsasthma may have on an individuals health it can cause poor oral health. Dental patients with asthma are more liable to suffer from increase in caries and gingivitis, chronic mouth breathing and decrease in saliva flow than the average patient. Though the dental patient with asthma medication helps their asthma, it puts their oral health at risk, Sultan Acyan (2016) found that The association between asthma and periodontal diseasecan both be attributed to the side effects of asthma medications and explained by the pathological activationof the and inflammatory mechanisms triggered by asthma(pg.7). Reports show that the medication asthmatic patients take can lead to dental erosion, dry mouth and mouth breathing, many of which cases are found in the united states today. Theprevalence of asthma in the world and in our country has reached to a considerable level, however, it tends to increase in our population. Impacts of the asthma medications on oral health have been suggested in several studies (Sultan Acyan, 2016, pg.7). However out of allthe age groups worldwide asthma is most prominently effecting children and causing dental carries in age ranges 7 to 14.Consideringthat asthma is such a common disorder affecting children, limited studies have investigated the effects of asthma on oral environment. The literature also reports that for those children withasthmathe prevalence of dentalcaries is ASTHMA 3 higher than in those without asthma. This increase in caries prevalence is in part associated with both altered salivary composition and salivary flow. Therehave also been reports suggesting that respiratory disorders are associated with dental enamel defectsA total of 208 children aged 7-14 years were examined in this study, of which 62 (59.6%) were males and 42 (40.4%) were females in the study group and in control group 55 (52.9%) were males and 49 (47.1%) were females. There was no statistically significant difference between males and females (P 0.05) as shown in [Table 1]. [Table 2] shows age wis e distribution of samples in study and control groups. There was no statistically significant difference between the age group in both the groups (P 0.05). {Table 1}{Table 2} (Vaibhav, Deepti Rathnaprabu, 2012, pg.6)Teeth free of dental enamel defects were seen in only 24 (23.1%) of the study group subjects and 76 (73.1%) of the control group subjects. Permanent tooth developmental defects of enamel were observed in 80 (76.9%) of the asthma group subjects and 28 (26.9%) of the control group subjects. [Table 3]. This was significant at a level of (P = 001). Demarcated opacities, which were observed in 46 asthma group subjects (44.2%) and 25 control group subjects (24%), constituted the most prevalent enamel defect observed in this population as shown in [Table 3].{Table 3} The occurrence of developmental defect of enamel correlated with symptom onset (P = 0.001) and with asthma severity (P = 0.001), as shown in [Table 4] and [Table 5], respectively. Logistic regression revealed that the risk of dental enamel defects is approximately 12 times higher for children with asthma as shown in [Table 6]. The ASTHMA 4occurrence of dental enamel defects was not found to correlate with the timing of initiation of treatment (P = 0.041). {Table 4}{Table 5}{Table 6}(Vaibhav, Deepti Rathnapura, 2012, p.6).Moreover as statistics show from the following paragraphs childrenfrom ages 7 to 14are the most prone to suffer from asthma and the bad oral diseasesit can bring with it, While taking a survey amongst children of the most common age groups for the ch ronic illness the journalists found that there was no statistic difference between the genders of the children,but rather that the teeth that were deemed free of dental enamel defects were the same age group of children but the ones without asthma. With these children starting out with bad dental health because of their asthma it will in turn effect a lot of their dental health in their adolescence or even adult years, spending lots of time and money investing in dental work.