Prevalence and Incidence of Caries in the Population Served with a New Preventive Approach Model between 2019-2023

Dental care has historically followed a surgical–interventionist approach; however, evidence clearly indicates that health promotion activities fostering self-care should be prioritized from early childhood. The objective of this study was to determine the prevalence and incidence of dental caries between 2019 and 2023 in a population aged 0–18 years attending a health center in Valdivia, Chile, under a new preventive-oriented Dental Care Model.This descriptive study included patients from a private health center who enrolled in an annual preventive oral care plan, known as Primary Dentists (Dentistas de Cabecera, DdC), between 2019 and 2023. A total of 752 patients aged 0–18 years were evaluated with informed consent from their legal guardians, following the World Health Organization (WHO) diagnostic criteria. Baseline caries prevalence at ages 2, 4, 6, 12, and 15 years was 24.5%, 52.1%, 64.4%, 46.7%, and 66.7%, respectively. Mean DMFT and dmft indices were 0.12 and 1.61, respectively. Only 93 children developed new cavitated carious lesions (NCCL), yielding an incidence rate of 0.063 per person-year for the overall study population. At follow-up (mean: 2 years), 87.6% of children remained free of NCCL under the DdC model, confirming the effectiveness of a preventive approach in reducing the burden of this highly prevalent and costly chronic disease. The prevalence and incidence of dental caries in preschool and school-age children treated under the DdC model in Valdivia were lower than those reported in the Chilean Ministry of Health’s National Oral Health Survey and in other national and international studies.