Dental caries and periodontal disease are the major oral diseases. Especially, dental caries is the main cause of tooth loss in children. DNIFT index in 12-year-old children in Korea has been increased such as 0.6 in 1972, 2.5 in 1979 and 3.1 in 1990. Approximately 50% or more of all the caries lesions in the mouth occur on the occlusal surfaces of the posterior teeth. Many children suffer from the dental caries. To relief the pain from the dental caries and to make their school-life enjoyable, we should prevent the dental caries, especially occlusal surface caries in children. The method available to prevent occlusal surface caries is sealants which occlude the deep pits and fissures of teeth and isolate the occlusal surfaces from the oral environments. As long as the sealants are retained, no more dental caries occur on occlusal surfaces. But if they are not retained fully or partially, it has a possibility that dental caries occur on occlusal surfaces.
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the amounts of carious lesions developed by the retention type of the sealants and then to decide whether the lost sealants would be replaced or not, and the last, to evaluate the cost-benefit effect of the pit and fissure sealants.
We will select 466 subjects who are from first to third grade children and have 1st molar in right and left side which is sound and has the deep pit and fissure. One side of 1st molar will be sealed (experimental group), the other will be not sealed(control group).
The results obtained as follows:
1. It took 5 minutes and 21 seconds in average to sealing on 1st molars.
2. The complete retention rate for light curing was 99.2% which was higher than for self curing.
3. In case of light curing, the complete retention rate was a little highly dried of cool air than dried of warm air.
4. It needs to progress and develop the incremental oral health care system as a way of national policy for child oral health .
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