Population Health

Global Oral Health and Nutrition

Community-based studies of child oral health and undernutrition in El Salvador, India, and Nepal, linking infant feeding and dietary practices to severe tooth decay and malnutrition in young children.

Closed Jan 2012 – 2015 Health Research for Action, UC Berkeley Project Director

Project details

methods

field epidemiology

principal investigator

Karen Sokal-Gutierrez

Severe tooth decay and undernutrition track together in young children, and both are shaped by how infants are fed. I was Project Director for the India and Nepal work from 2012 to 2015, measuring those links through community surveys and a Mumbai intervention, in a program that also produced Achalu et al. (2021) on sugary liquids in El Salvador and Khadka et al. (2016).

publications

Sugary Liquids in the Baby Bottle: Risk for Child Undernutrition and Severe Tooth Decay in Rural El Salvador (2020)
A Community-Based Intervention to Reduce Tooth Decay and Malnutrition in Mumbai, India (2016)