WHO. World Health Organization price £25.00; pp 125 ISBN

9789241548649

This manual aims to encourage national oral health survey planners to standardise measurements of oral diseases and conditions that are important for planning and evaluation of oral health programmes, as well as to ensure the comparability of data collected in a wide range of environments. It does this by applying the WHO global approach to chronic disease surveillance to an operational model for integration of oral health into chronic disease surveillance systems.

This manual is now in its fifth edition. Since the fourth edition, the WHO has developed new tools for implementation of oral health surveys. In addition to guidelines for clinical examination of oral health status, instruments have been developed for surveillance of self-reported oral health and related risk factors. Due to the shared major risk factors of non-communicable chronic and oral diseases, the WHO STEPwise approach to surveillance (STEPS) facilitates the inclusion of oral health in national surveillance systems for non-communicable chronic diseases.

Section one of the manual provides background information for survey planners on the methods and approaches relevant to collection of clinical data on oral health status. Section two covers self-reporting of oral health and the risk factors assessed by means of questionnaires. The final section describes survey activity, such as data analysis and survey reporting.

In the acknowledgements section, it says the web-based version of this manual is available from the oral health page of the WHO website. The online version can also be accessed from www.icd.org/content/publications/WHO-Oral-Health-Surveys-Basic-Methods-5th-Edition-2013.pdf. This is due to the financial support from the Philip Dear Foundation, the European section of the International College of Dentists.

This manual is essential reading for all dentists wishing to undertake oral health surveys. It is a practical guide and very useful. It is clearly and concisely written. Fifteen pages of 71 colour plates are included to enhance the text.

This new publication will facilitate education within dental public health and easy access to the online version of the manual will be of great help for survey implementation in developing countries.