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Impact of war on oral health: a systematic review

Evidence-Based Dentistry (2024)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

Aim

To systematically review the evidence from published literature about the impact of war on oral health among children and adults.

Methodology

The electronic search was carried out in the following databases Pubmed, Cochrane, Scopus, Embase, Google Scholar. In vitro studies, cross-sectional, case control studies, and randomized controlled trials conducted during the war time were included. Cross-sectional and case control studies were assessed based on the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale, whereas randomized controlled trials were assessed based on the ROBINS-I tool. In-vitro studies included in this review were assessed using the United States national toxicology program tool.

Results

The search strategy yielded a total of 5126 articles and finally 21 articles were included in the review. The influence of war on oral health was categorized among both the children and adult population. A total of 14 studies were carried out in children whereas the remaining seven studies were carried out in adults. A decrease in dental caries was observed in more war-prone areas due to the limited availability of carbohydrates and sugar. Severe periodontal disease in the adult population, mainly due to less availability of food and diminished oral hygiene habits, was also reported.

Conclusions

This review underscores the multifaceted impact of war on oral health, revealing a notable prevalence of periodontal problems, craniofacial injuries and varying rates of dental caries across affected populations.

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Data availability

The data are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Agartala Government Dental College & IGM Hospital, Agartala, India

    Manali Deb Barma

  2. Division of Public Health Dentistry, CDER-AIIMS, New Delhi, India

    Upendra Singh Bhadauria, Bharathi Purohit & Deepali Agarwal

  3. Maulana Azad Institute of Dental Sciences, New Delhi, India

    Sneha Malhotra

  4. Division of Public Health Dentistry, Centre for Dental Education and Research, AIIMS, New Delhi, India

    Harsh Priya

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  1. Manali Deb Barma
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  2. Upendra Singh Bhadauria
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  3. Bharathi Purohit
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  4. Sneha Malhotra
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  5. Deepali Agarwal
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  6. Harsh Priya
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Contributions

MDB: conception, data acquisition and drafted the manuscript. USB: Data acquisition, visualization, interpretation, and drafted the manuscript. BP: synthesis and critically revised the paper. SM: Data acquisition and synthesis. DA: Data acquisition and interpretation. HP: Conception, provision and management of study literature resources, critically revised the paper. All authors gave their final approval and agreed to be accountable for all aspects of the work. The authors read and approved the final paper. Author 1 and 2 have contributed equally.

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Correspondence to Harsh Priya.

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Barma, M.D., Bhadauria, U.S., Purohit, B. et al. Impact of war on oral health: a systematic review. Evid Based Dent (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41432-024-01006-6

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