Prevalence and pattern of restorations on permanent molar teeth among adult dental patients

Objective: To assess the prevalence and pattern of restorations on permanent molar teeth among adult dental patients.Method: This was a cross-sectional descriptive study involving patients who presented to the Restorative clinic of the University of Benin Teaching Hospital.The molars of the participants were examined and classified as restored, unrestored or missing.The restored molars were further examined for type of restoration and status of the restoration whether defective or not.Statistical analysis was done using IBM SPSS version 21.0.Descriptive statistics was carried out on the generated data and chi square statistics was used to determine the statistically significant differences between variables.Results: A total of 708 molars in 54 participants were examined and classified as restored, unrestored or missing.Prevalence of restored molars was 12.0% while the prevalence of unrestored and missing molars was 83.8% and 4.2% respectively.A higher proportion of restored molars were seen in female participants (67.8%).There was a statistically significant association between the status of the molar and type of molar teeth (p=0.001), with the first molar being the most frequently restored molar (45.9%).The lower arch had a higher prevalence (13.6%) of restored molars.The most prevalent type of material used for restoration was amalgam (83.5%) while composite and gold crown restorations accounting for 1.2% each.Majority (81.1%) of the restorations were not defective.Conclusion: There was a high prevalence of restored molars with the first molars being the most restored molars and amalgam the most frequent restoration placed.