Parental Acceptance and Perception of Silver Diamine Flouride Application Among A Sample of Egyptian Children

Dental caries is one of the most common diseases in the world, with a prevalence of 69%-79% . Early childhood caries (ECC) has been recognized by the American Dental Association as an important public health issue and was defined as presence of 1 or more decayed, missing, or filled tooth surfaces (dmfs) in any primary tooth in a preschool-aged child . Caries was known to be managed through two main approaches: Treatment, which includes drill and fill which is a challenge specially in minimally cooperative children and the second approach is prevention which depends on cease the process of caries formation at an early stage which is more effective . One of the recently marketed preventive measures of dental caries is silver diamine fluoride (SDF) .

In 2014, SDF was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration as a treatment for dentinal sensitivity .It was proven to be a cost-effective, minimally invasive, and handy treatment . Silver diamine flouride is easy to apply in a minimally cooperative individual . More important, it has shown a noticeable success rate in caries prevention, especially in early childhood caries cases . It provides families with an alternative solutions for managing dental caries, particularly if caries was detected at an early stage . Moreover, it could save time and effort for both families and dental teams.

The major downside of SDF is the unesthetic permanent black discoloration of the arrested lesion , which could affect parental acceptance for the treatment and may result in shifting to another esthetically acceptable treatment.