Can parental pain catastrophizing influence the relationship between dental caries and pain in early childhood?

Objective: Knowledge on the parents’ catastrophizing of the children’s dental pain is lacking. This study aimed to verify whether parental pain catastrophizing influences the relationship between caries and dental pain in early childhood and if the child’s age interacts with this relationship. Study design: A cross-sectional study was carried out with 83 dyads of children and their parents/primary caregivers. The parents answered the Brazilian version of the Pain Catastrophizing Scale-Parents and the Dental Discomfort Questionnaire. The children were examined to measure their caries experience. Correlations, simple mediation, and conditional process analyses were performed. Results: The research participants were mostly male children (50.6%) with a mean age of 38 months (Q1 33.0, Q3 48.0). Most of the parents were mothers (n = 73; 88.0%) and had catastrophic thoughts (80.7%). Perceived dental pain in the child was positively correlated with the child’s caries experience and parental pain catastrophizing. The parents’ catastrophizing did not mediate the relationship between the caries experience and the pain intensity (a * b = 0.05; the lowest level of the confidence interval: −0.01; upper level of the confidence interval: 0.14). The child’s age did not moderate the direct or indirect effect of the caries experience on the pain intensity of the children. Conclusion: In early childhood, parental catastrophizing of the children’s pain and children’s age does not influence the direct relationship between children’s caries experience reported by the dentist and children’s dental pain reported by parents.

Dental caries; Toothache; Catastrophizing; Child; Preschool; Pain assessment

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