Abstract

QUINONES YBARRIA, María Elena et al. Nutritional status: Its relation to the appearance of deforming oral habits in children. Rev Cubana Estomatol [online]. 2006, vol.43, n.3, pp. 0-0. ISSN 1561-297X.

A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted to evaluate 230 children aged 2-5. 115 of them were eutrophic and 115 were malnourished, according to the Cuban weight and height tables. Biochemical and clinical tests were made aimed at describing the presence of oral infantile habits more related to the structural oral changes that lead to abnormal occlusions, as well as their association with the nutritional status at birth. The following variables were studied.: nutritional status, birth weight, infantile deglutition habit, finger suction, oral breathing and use of nursing bottle. The presence of the infantile deglutition habit proved to be 13.91 % for the eutrophic, and 24.34 % for the malnourished. The finger suction habit also prevailed in the group of malnourished children, accounting for 11.30 %, whereas it was 9.56 % in the eutrophic children. As to the oral breathing habit, it was higher in the group of malnourished children with 13.04 %, whereas among the eutrophic it was 4.34 %. The nursing bottle and the previous habits increased in the children with an unfavorable nutritional state and in the eutrophic, too, accounting for 38.26 % and 29.56 %, respectively.

Keywords : Nutritional status; habits..