This study aimed to investigate dental care utilization, treatment characteristics, and costs among pediatric patients with rare diseases in Korea. In this multicenter retrospective study, we reviewed records of 275 patients aged < 18 years with rare disease V codes who visited 11 university dental hospitals between 2000 and 2025. The five most prevalent disease categories were analyzed. Demographics, systemic conditions, dental treatment patterns, and per-visit costs were compared using the chi-square test, Fisher’s exact test, and Wilcoxon rank-sum test. Among the patients with available medical records, 74.7% received treatment for the rare disease, 53.3% used medications, and 98.6% had an American Society of Anesthesiologists class ≥ II status. The median number of annual dental visits and proportion of preventive treatments were 2.5 and 0.3, respectively. General anesthesia and outpatient sedation were performed in 42.9% and 21.2% of treated patients, respectively, with the V233 (epileptic syndromes) group showing a significantly different treatment modality distribution (p = 0.019). The median total dental cost per visit was 145,000 KRW, with the V128 (cerebrovascular diseases) group showing significantly higher costs across all categories (p < 0.05). This nationwide multicenter cohort study provides quantitative insights into the dental care characteristics of Korean pediatric patients with rare diseases and underscores the need to strengthen preventive care and expand institutional support for high-cost treatments.
Eum et al. (Sun,) studied this question.