[Strategies to reform oral health care systems: dental caries].

Current strategies for improving oral and dental health in the community are, in general, relatively inefficient and definitely costly. They are inappropriate for industrialized nations and offer few realistic options to underdeveloped countries. Ideally, systems of community oral health should have clearly defined objectives, pursue preventive strategies, be oriented toward health promotion, prefer public health programs to those directed at the individual patient, and manifest their commitment to offer realistic opportunities for good oral and dental health of the entire society. This article offers a profile of such strategies, aimed at reforming attention to oral and dental health, specially in regards to dental caries and restoration treatments.