Sugars Consumption of Northumbrian Children Aged 11–14 Years

Abstract

In order to investigate the relationships between diet and tooth decay the authors recently completed the first longitudinal study of diet and dental caries increment in children. 405 children initially aged 11.5 years each recorded their intake of foods and drinks for a total of 15 days over a period of 2 years. This is a review of some of the findings.

The evidence implicating consumption of sugars in the causation of dental caries is both diverse and overwhelming (Rugg-Gunn, 1983). Of the 30 or so observational studies relating diet and dental caries in children, all except one have been cross-sectional in design. Such a design is unsatisfactory in older children at least because there is little reason why a lifetime's caries experience should be related to a single estimate of dietary intake. In addition there have been few reports of the food intake in general, and sugars intake in particular, of children in the UK. A longitudinal survey of intake could indicate how choice of foods changes with age and if repeated could show how preferences change over time. The National Food Survey has provided some information on food acquisition (not consumption) over the past 40 years (Derry and Buss, 1984). Unfortunately, besides not estimating consumption this survey does not include foods bought and consumed away from the home such as confectionery and soft drinks. Furthermore, this survey collects data by household and so information for age and sex specific groups is not available. Comments regarding sugars consumption amongst children must be derived from data collected from properly designed dietary surveys of defined groups of individuals. Such knowledge of what children eat is essential to the planning of effective health education campaigns.

In order to contribute to the understanding of the relationship between diet and caries in children and to contribute to health education a longitudinal study was undertaken which had the following aim: to rank some defined dietary factors either singly or in combination in the order in which they explain the dental caries increment of over 400 children.