Maltrato infantil y Odontología: de la identificación al reporte del caso

Resumen

Introduction. Child abuse is still a prevalent problem in the society. In order to be detected, the dentist should be aware of every sign and symptom that could be used to make a diagnosis of suspected child abuse, along with the way to report it, in order to be investigated. Matherial and methods. A systematic review has been carried out according to the PRISMA criteria. The original articles were obtained in the BUCea database, through the Cisne catalogue from the Dentistry School of Universidad Complutense of Madrid. Results. There are a myriad of classifications for the child abuse research. Most of them are classified according to their typology: either by the time it is produced, the author or the activity itself. More than half of the injuries produced by child abuse are concentrated in the craniofacial region. For this reason, there are oral aspects of child abuse which should be considered by the dentist. Conclusions. After analysing the possible injuries which might alert the dentist that he/she is facing a child abuse case, the way to gather such information in order to be assessed by the authorities becomes particularly important. Therefore, knowing how to fill an injuries report is essential. In this article, an specific injuries report model is proposed for the dentist in order to ease the data gathering observed in the child patient subjected to maltreatment.