Abstract
PURPOSE : The purpose of this study was to examine the oral health behaviors of child users of local children's centers before and after receiving oral health education in an effort to develop a well-organized oral health education program. METHOD : The subjects in this study were the elementary school students who used 13 different local children's centers in the city of Busan. The questionnaire was intended for children and consisted of 31 items, which were four about eating food, three about washing hands, two about smoking, five about toothbrushing and dental clinic visit, five about tooth damage and dental pain, seven about knowledge and awareness of dental health and six about dental health attitude. RESULT : 1. The rate of the children who replied they didn't brush their teeth on the previous day stood at 5.8 percent before the program, and this rate rose to 13.0 percent after that. The differences were significant(p=0.026). 2. The rate of the former after the program stood at 61 percent, and that of the latter stood at 39 percent. The differences were statistically significant(p=0.019). CONCLUSION : The oral health behaviors were investigated before and after oral health education was provided, and this education was found not to be sufficient enough to change their oral health care. So it seems necessary to increase the frequency of oral health education by providing it twice a year. In addition, oral health education programs geared toward teachers in local children's centers who spend time with children should additionally be strengthened to offer more education to these children.