A Pilot Study to Promote Maternal and Infant Oral Health

The long term goals of this project are to develop and implement a combined prenatal and postnatal intervention to decrease early childhood caries. The program is based on risk assessment, diet intervention and counseling. To accomplish these goals a pilot study is needed to determine: 1) The ability to recruit and retain pregnant mothers in an intervention program; 2) The levels of S. mutans in pregnant mothers; 3) The ability of a diet intervention to decrease S. mutans in pregnant mothers.