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Prevention of Dental Caries

The Sum of Community, Professional, and Individual Efforts

National Institute of Dental Research, Bethesda, MD

The focus of this article is how the primary prevention of dental caries has been effected utilizing a combination of community, professional, and individual efforts. The review demonstrates that improvements have been made in the dental caries level and that a complex offactors are implicated in the disease process. The information presented demonstrates that measures are available currently to prevent dental caries. Based on what is known, this article shows that a combination of water fluoridation, professionally applied sealants, and individually or professionally applied topical fluorides (including dentifrices) provides the best opportunityforpopulations to be caries-free or have a low caries rate. Basic to the success of these approaches is awareness and compliance at both the professional and individual levels. Further acceptance is shown to be more dependent on social and psychologicalprocesses than on the actual efficacy of any mechanical, immunologic, or chemical techniques, existing or developing. This is the basis of future research directions.

Evaluation & the Health Professions, Vol. 10, No. 3, 323-341 (1987)
DOI: 10.1177/016327878701000305


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