[Oral hygiene of preschool children in Kaunas city and their parents' attitude towards children's oral health].

The aim of the study was to evaluate oral hygiene of the preschool children, their oral hygiene behavior and their parents' attitude towards children's oral health. In the present study 1656 preschool children were examined and 958 parents completed a questionnaire on oral hygiene, parental attitudes to children's oral health. The findings of the study showed that oral hygiene status was not satisfactory even in 43.2% of children (values of Simplified Oral Hygiene Index varied from 1.1 to 6.0). No statistically significant difference was found between boys and girls. According to the parents' answers to the questions about oral hygiene habits it was found that 41.0% of parents brush their teeth irregularly. Fourteen percent of parents brushed their children teeth, only 5.0% of parents started to brush children's teeth when the first tooth erupted, 21.2% took their child to a dentist systematically and 31.7% of children visited the dentist for the first time due dental pain. Nearly a half of parents (44.9%) referred that their children's teeth started to decay at the first year of their lives. However, even 12.0% of parents refused to include their children in preventive program on dental caries.