Assessment of Discomfort Experienced by School Children While Performing ‘ART’ and ‘MCP’-An Experimental Study

Objective: atraumatic restorative treatment (art) is a minimal intervention technique in the management of carious lesions, which results in negligible dis-comfort to the patient. the aim of this study was to assess and compare the dis-comfort levels during atraumatic restorative treatment and minimal cavity preparation (mcp: a method using rotary instruments) treatment procedures in a sample of school children in davangere city.materials and methods: an experimental study was performed aimed at com-paring discomfort levels as measured by subjective (venham index) and objective (heart rate) methods at six specified moments during the treatment. a total of 200 children were randomly divided into two groups of 100 each. in each child, one class ii restoration with gic in a deciduous molar was performed. one group re-ceived treatment using rotary instruments (mcp) and the other group with art. discomfort levels were measured using venham index (behavioural dimension) and heart rate (physiological dimension).results: the behavioural measurement revealed that in art group the majority of the children(64%) showed an overall venham score of „<1‟(relaxed) as com-pared to mcp group in which the majority of children (76%) showed a venham score of „1‟(uneasy). the physiological measurement revealed that the children in art group experienced less discomfort when compared to children in mcp group.conclusion: the results of the study suggest that art induces less discomfort; is patient friendly and has a higher extent of community acceptance when compared to mcp.