The Correlation Between Screen Time and Caries Experience in Children 12 years Old and Younger. Korb K, Dingrando K, (University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY)

Purpose:  Dental caries is the most common chronic disease of children in the United States and is  associated with many detrimental conditions including pain, infection, loss in school days, increased caries incidence in permanent dentition and reduced quality of life. Therefore continuous search for factors that influence its prevalence are needed. Screen time refers to time spent using a device such as a computer, television, video game console, or smart phones/tablets. It has been demonstrated that screen time affects diet quality, and can displace oral health habits leading to increased risk of dental caries. The purpose of this study is to examine the association between the amount of screen and dental caries prevalence children 1-12 years of age.
 

Methods: A survey completed by parents regarding their child’s screen time usage will be utilized. The caries prevalence (dmft or DMFT) in relation to the amount of screen time will be analyzed. For demographic variables and survey responses, descriptive statistics will be calculated and reported. Poisson regression will be used to model the relationship between cavities and screen time, while adjusting for survey responses and other covariates of interest. All analyses will be completed in SAS 9.4 and R 4.0.3. A p-value of less than 0.05 will be used to determine statistical significance.

Results: Results pending

Conclusions: Pending. We believe that the more time spent on screens will have a positive correlation to caries experience as depicted by higher dmft, with children with less screen time having less dental caries experience.