Patterns of breast and bottle feeding and their association with dental caries in 1- to 4-year-old South African children. 2. A case control study of children with nursing caries.

In a case control study, 109 children with nursing caries (> or = 2 decayed, missing, or filled labial or palatal surfaces of primary incisor teeth) were matched for age, race, gender, and social class to 109 children without nursing caries from the same study areas. Mean dmfs and dmft scores were statistically higher in the nursing caries group but no statistically significant differences were found for feeding patterns between the groups in relation to the prevalence of nursing caries. In the present study nursing caries was found to be unrelated to the length of type of feeding (breast or bottle).