Abstract:
Dental problems are an important health concern posing different challenges in delivery of care. These problems include developmental disorders, acquired defects such as dental caries and periodontal diseases, infective lesions which may have a systemic link and drug induced dental conditions. The manifestations of dental problems are insidious and the accentuation of these problems is quite rapid. Also the response to these findings in the child patient from the parents is quite tepid. An urgent understanding of these oro-dental problems, awareness about newer methods of diagnoses, accessibility to different treatment options and their impact on quality of life is the need of the hour across specialities. The domain of pediatric dentistry is ever expanding with availability of better diagnostic tools and presence of evidence based guidelines for optimal and effective care. The combined efforts by pediatric dentists and paediatricians are important tools in catering to the burden of disease and its effective care. Dental caries is the most prevalent non communicable disease affecting almost 50 percent of global population and thus, the understanding of pathophysiology and awareness of contemporary treatment options is an urgency which cannot be ignored. The dental care especially caries treatment and prevention, thus, requires concatenation of multidisciplinary efforts to rid the ever increasing burden of care in pediatric patients. This paper will thus aim to give brief insights into identifying, diagnosing, and caring for children with dental problems of varying severity and their age appropriate treatment methods based on contemporary standards of global dental care.
