Background: Many questionnaires have been developed to measure dental anxiety andfear. Among them is the Index of Dental Anxiety and Fear Scale (IDAF-4C+), which consists of adental anxiety and fear module (IDAF-4C), a phobia module (IDAF-P) and a stimulus module(IDAF-S). The objective of this research was to report the adaptation and validation of the IDAF-4C+ for Malaysian secondary school children.Methods: This was a cross‑sectional validation study. The original English version of theIDAF-4C+ was translated into Malay, back-translated, and then sent for content validation via anexpert validation and face validation by the target student population. Three hundred and seventyquestionnaires were then distributed among 16-year-old school children. Confirmatory factoranalysis (CFA) was conducted for the IDAF-4C module using a bootstrapped maximum likelihoodestimator. Spearman’s rank correlation was used to assess the relationship between the IDAF‑Sand IDAF-4C modules. Intraclass correlation (ICC) was used to determine the stability of theIDAF-S and IDAF-4C modules, while kappa values were used for the IDAF-P module.Results: The response rate was 86.5% for CFA and 76.9% for stability. CFA showed theexistence of only one factor with a reliability estimate of 0.921, obtained via Raykov’s procedure.All items in the IDAF-S module were significantly correlated with the IDAF-4C module (P <0.001). The IDAF-S and IDAF-4C modules were stable, as determined via a two-way mixed modelwith absolute agreement, a single measure and a Case 3 ICC (A, 1). The IDAF-P module showedsatisfactory stability, as assessed via kappa values.Conclusion: The Malay version of the IDAF-4C+ is valid and reliable in measuring dentalanxiety and fear among Malaysian secondary school children.

ABSTRACT In the management of periodontitis patients, periodontal risk assessment (PRA) tool is currently being applied during periodontal review (PR). However, an assessment of risk profiles during examination and diagnosis (E&D) may and would effectively assess and diagnose patients’ periodontal conditions, provide personalised treatment planning, and render an enhanced patient care through periodontal management by risk assessment (PEMBRA). From a retrospective study on selected records of 81 patients treated for chronic periodontitis, the PRA profiles of the patients were evaluated during E&D and two to three months after completion of nonsurgical periodontal therapy (NSPT) during PR. The results were analysed using SPSS version 24 for descriptive statistics. On E&D, the patients presented with 25.9% localised and 74.1% generalised chronic periodontitis. Of these, 2.5% of low-risk patients on E&D increased to 21% during PR signifying an improvement after the treatment. However, the medium-risk patients have a slight increase from 32% to 35%, and patients with a high risk of 62% were reduced to 43%. The improvement of the risk profiles for both low and high-risk groups was mostly contributed by the reduction in the plaque score, percentages of bleeding on probing (BOP), and probing pocket depth (PPD) ≥ 5 mm. This evidence-based evaluation of PRA tool during E&D and PR is important for PEMBRA as it encouraged the clinicians to adopt periodontal management through basic periodontal examination, detailed periodontal charting, radiographic interpretation, tooth per tooth prognosis, diagnosis, and targeted NSPT.
Risk Assessment ; Periodontal Diseases -- diagnosis ; Dental Instruments

Introduction: Numerous studies have examined both the effect of caries and dental care under general anaesthesia affecting children and children with special needs, but there is still scant information on the relationship between both classes. Thus this project is aimed i) to compare oral health-related quality of life in children and children with special needs undergoing dental care under general anaesthesia (GA) and ii) To compare the impact on oral health-related quality of life in children and children with special needs. Methods: Forty-six children (25 normal children, 21 children with special needs) are recruited. Participating parents completed a brief version of the Perceptions Questionnaire (P-CPQ) and Family Impact Scale (FIS) before the treatment and subsequent follow-up appointments (4 weeks to 8 weeks). Oral symptoms, social health, psychology, functional limitation, and family effect ratings, the mean, standard deviations, and statistical differences between groups were analysed. Results: 52.2% of both parent groups rated the oral health status of their children as low before GA, and it improved considerably, with 69.6% of parents rating post-operatively as healthy. The most recorded impacts at baseline were pain, discomfort, often annoyed and angry among children and parents feeling guilty and upset due to the condition of the child. Conclusion: Oral rehabilitation under GA leads to the immediate improvement of oral health, mental, and social quality among the children in both groups. However, for parents of children with special needs, despite the effort to eradicate dental-related issues, the overall quality of life shows no significant improvements.