Effect of Health Behaviors Education on Oral Health Improvement in Anxious Children in Sanandaj, 2018; a Pilot Study

This study investigated the effect of education on the shaping of oral health behaviors in children with high anxiety identified based on Spence Anxiety Scale.

This was a descriptive-analytic study which was carried out on eighty children between 8 and 15 years old living in Welfare Organization affiliated centers in Sanandaj in 2018. Sampling was done by convenience method. Children's anxiety was assessed using Spence-Childhood Anxiety Scale. Fifty two children with high anxiety level were identified and they were randomly assigned to control and experimental groups. Plaque index was measured in all anxious children both at the beginning of the study and one month after the intervention. Data were analyzed by SPSS software version 21.

The results showed that anxiety mean level in the experimental group was higher than that in the control one (p <0.05). The mean score of index plaque in the control group did not differ significantly from the experimental group before the intervention (p <0.05), but it was significantly higher in the control group after the intervention (p <0.05).

Health behavior training was effective on improving plaque index in short term, and general anxiety in children was not a barrier to accepting, shaping and modifying oral health behaviors.