Prevalence of oral mucosal lesions and variations in Indian public school children

Aim: To study the nature and distribution of oral mucosal lesions and variations in children. Methods: This investigation was a cross-sectional study. All the study subjects were taken from government primary school. Children were in the age group of 4-14years. The children who were attending the Department of Pediatric Dentistry for dental check up were examined. Results: A total of 1,003 children were included in the present study,. The mucosal lesions were observed in 643 (64.11%) children, developmental variations of mucosa were evident in 220 (21.93%) children and normal mucosal variations were present in 391 (38.98%) children. The most commonly observed mucosal lesions were gingivitis, gingival abscess and traumatic ulcers. The most frequent developmental mucosal variations were ankyloglossia and high frenal attachment. Normal mucosal variations noted were linea alba buccalis and fordyce’s spots. Distribution of mucosal lesions/variations were same among both the gender except fordyce’s spots (p=0.018). Parotid papillae and pigmented spots had positive relation with age. Conclusions: Mucosal lesions/variations were present in more than half of the children in this study. Only few oral mucosal lesions had gender differences and vary with age