Children and parents' perspectives on the acceptability of three management strategies for dental caries in primary teeth within the 'Filling Children's Teeth: Indicated or Not' (FiCTION) randomised controlled trial - a qualitative study.

The Filling Children's Teeth: Indicated Or Not? (FiCTION) randomised controlled trial (RCT) aimed to explore the clinical- and cost-effectiveness of managing dental caries in children's primary teeth. The trial compared three management strategies: conventional caries management with best practice prevention (C + P), biological management with best practice prevention (B + P) and best practice prevention alone (PA)-based approaches. Recently, the concept of treatment acceptability has gained attention and attempts have been made to provide a conceptual definition, however this has mainly focused on adults. Recognising the importance of evaluating the acceptability of interventions in addition to their effectiveness, particularly for multi-component complex interventions, the trial design included a qualitative component. The aim of this component was to explore the acceptability of the three strategies from the perspectives of the child participants and their parents.