Oral Health and Dental Management

Abstract

Activity of the caries process

Milena Peneva

The contemporary non-operative approach in cariesology requires a new type of diagnosing. It is an approach that embraces the early detection of the caries lesions and the early specification of the character of the caries process at the moment of examination. Such an approach allows the early diagnosing of the active caries process as well as the early modelling of the process. The broadly used in epidemiological studies DMF index provides no information for the activity of the caries process, for the quantity of the reversible lesions as well as for what non-operative treatment should be applied. The index has been created as early as 1930 when the operative treatment was dominant. On the basis of the epidemiological study of a 1000 children aged 6 - 15 as well as with the help of a methodology embracing strict criteris for the separate diagnostic bands and for the activity of the caries lesions, an IA index was created showing the strength of the current caries process and supplementing the information obtained by means of the DMFT and DMFS indexes. The index could be very helpful in obtaining information within any epidemiological study and would facilitate the choise adequate therapeutic approach in accordance with the caries process observed.