Paediatric Dental Care in COVID-19 Pandemic - Time to Rethink - A Review

Abstract

Corona virus infection has affected many people and resulted in numerous deaths SARS-CoV-2 is a novel strain of coronavirus that has not been recognized in humans earlier The disease originated in China and has now become a pandemic affecting countries worldwide The clinical characteristics in children seem to be milder as compared to adults, but the exact clinical features related COVID-19 are still unknown and unclear This is the reason why a child can be considered as a silent carrier for COVID-19 The pandemic has affected the children as well Children usually suffer from the most common oral disease of dental caries Dental caries in children has been attributed to having its pathophysiology related in a cytokine response In the recent COVID-19 pandemic, the adverse outcomes in children, though reported less, has been related to the establishment of a cytokine storm, the components of which are common with the cytokine expression profile of Dental caries and early childhood caries in children Early carious lesions results in early involvement of dental pulp thereby resulting in periapical pathology The open carious lesions can result in the direct entry of virus from saliva in the dental pulp of infected patients The resulting periapical pathology contains viral load and hence virus enters the blood circulation A dental setting is at a high risk of cross infection amid patients and dental practitioner s owing to the spread of infection via droplets suspended in the air by infected symptomatic or asymptomatic subjects This article informs about measures which reduce facility risk, manage symptomatic patients and protect personal health care and management with reference to pediatric dentistry The antimicrobial therapy to be given to pediatric patients has been also highlighted in the present review The clinical characteristics of COVID-19 in children, though they are milder are given equal importance Also this article reviews the precautions and guidelines to be followed by the dentists The present article reviews the impact of Coronavirus infection on pediatric dental practice and gives the future recommendations The present article also gives the future directions to the government which can considered if possible