Abstract Introduction: Oral health is an essential component of overall well-being and the general health of a child. Parents are the role models for their children, who can instil healthy preventive oral habits in them, provided they themselves have a good knowledge of dental diseases and their prevention. Thus, parents should master the preventive oral habits in their early lives. This would help in creating a beneficial effect on their child’s dental health as well. Aim: To evaluate oral health awareness in parents and its relationship with the dental health status of their children aged 6–12 years. Materials and Methods: The parents were a validated multiple-choice questionnaire, which focused on their level of awareness about oral health knowledge. Their knowledge was graded on a 2-point scale: grade 1-satisfactory, grade 2-unsatisfactory, for the ease of statistical analysis. Thorough clinical examination of their children was performed, and decayed, missing, and filled teeth (DMFT) were detected according to dmft/DMFT index for primary and permanent dentitions, respectively. Finally, the relationship between parents’ awareness versus caries status of their children was assessed. Results: The mean dmft and DMFT was significantly higher for children whose parents were graded 2. Mean dmft score decreased from 6 to 11 years, while mean DMFT score increased from 7 to 12 years. Prevalence of caries in primary and permanent dentitions did not vary significantly, according to parents’ oral health knowledge. Conclusion: Parents’ knowledge can be one of the main key factors in preventing oral diseases and promoting the oral health of their children. Thus, there is a need to enhance dental health education activities, targeting parents, besides their children, so that appropriate strategies to prevent dental caries start at an early age.
Dey et al. (Thu,) studied this question.