Relationship between Severe Early Childhood Caries and breast milk`s lactose among 12-24 month old children.

Abstract Aim: The study aimed to investigate the relationship between the occurrence of Severe Early Childhood Caries (S-ECC) and breast milk lactose, in infants aged 12 to 24 months.Material and Methods: This cross-sectional descriptive-analytical study was carried out in April to July 2020 on 30 children aged 12 to 24 months with or without S-ECC who were solely breastfed Also, the mothers answered questions about their breastfeeding. After the child's dental visit, the mother was asked to express 10 to 20 ml of her milk as a sample and give it to the researchers. The samples were immediately kept at -4 ° C and then they were tested to lactose measurement. Finally, the test results were analyzed by SPSS 21 software. Results: The average amount of lactose in the breast milk of cases with S-ECC infant was 5.74g/100 ml, and the average amount of lactose in the breast milk of cases without S-ECC infant was 4.64g/100 ml. There was no significant difference in lactose concentration between the two groups (p=0/64). The average number of breastfeeding times in cases with S-ECC infants was 7.87 per day while in the healthy cases this was 7.33 per day. There was no significant difference between the numbers of breastfeeding times per day in the two groups.Conclusion: According to this study, the average level of lactose in the breast milk samples was lower than the average level of lactose in breast milk in other countries, and the amount of lactose in breast milk of children with S-ECC was slightly higher than the amount of lactose in breast milk in children with healthy teeth.