Children with decayed teeth ‘should go to social services’
CHILDREN with severe tooth decay should be referred to social services, a Kings College Hospital study recommends.
Researchers at the hospital in London found that two out of every five children who needed oral and maxillofacial surgery due to dental decay over a two-year period were already known to social services.
Their findings have led to the introduction of a new care pathway for children admitted to its A&E unit who require such treatment, which will see them assessed for neglect and referred to the safeguarding team accordingly.
The study’s authors said they also wanted to see their review, which is published in the British Dental Journal, rolled out across the NHS. Dental neglect is defined as the persistent failure to meet a child’s basic oral health needs, which is likely to result in the serious impairment of their oral health, general health or development.
The team looked at the patient data of children who attended King’s with a dental/oral maxillofacial infection that required surgery under general anaesthetic between January 2015 and January 2017, and found there were 27 children aged between two and 15.
Eleven of the children (40.7per cent) were already known to social services prior to hospital admission.
Marielle Kabban, a consultant paediatric dentist and co-author of the study, said: “Where patients or carers repeatedly fail to access dental treatment for a child’s tooth decay or leave dental pain untreated, alarm bells should ring for clinicians to consider neglect.
“Awareness and confidence to escalate concerns, as well as educate nondental healthcare workers, is essential to recognise dental neglect early and arrange treatment.”
The number of hospital admissions for tooth decay among five to nineyear-olds rose to 26,000 last year, according to data from NHS Digital.
Tooth decay was the main reason for hospital admissions among five to nine-year-olds in England – with more than twice as many such cases than of tonsillitis.