TY - JOUR ID - TI - Oral hygiene practices and self-perceived halitosis among dental students AU - Ghufran A. Hasan PY - 2014 VL - 26 IS - 3 SP - 58 EP - 62 JO - Journal of baghdad college of dentistry مجلة كلية طب الاسنان بغداد SN - 18171869 23115270 AB - Background: Halitosis represents a common dental condition, although sufferers are often not conscious of it. It iscommon among humans around the world and is usually caused by an accumulation of bacteria in the mouth as aresult of gum disease, food, or plaque. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of oral hygiene practices,smoking habits and halitosis among undergraduate dental students and correlate the oral hygiene practices, oralhealth conditions to the prevalence of self perceived oral malodor.Materials and Methods: Clinical examination of 250 dental students and a self-administered questionnaire wereincluded in this study. A questionnaire was developed to assess the self-reported perception of oral breath,awareness of bad breath, timing of bad breath, oral hygiene practices, caries and bleeding gums, dryness of themouth, smoking and tongue coating.Results: The results indicated that female students had better oral hygiene practices. Significantly less self-reportedoral bad breath (P = 0.000) was found in female dental students (40%) as compared to male (70%). It was found thatsmoking had statistically highly significant correlation with halitosis (P = 0.000). Presence of other oral conditions suchas dental caries and filled carious lesions also showed higher prevalence of halitosis in dental students.Conclusion Oral hygiene practices and oral health conditions are very important factors in halitosis. Femalesexhibited better oral hygiene practices and less prevalence of halitosis as compared to male students

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