The effects of number of natural teeth and number of posterior occluding pairs on the oral health-related quality of life in Thai elderly patients at Faculty of Dentistry, Chulalongkorn University

Abstract

The objectives of this study were 1) to compare the oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) of Thai elderly dental patients at Faculty of Dentistry, Chulalongkorn University who had at least 20 natural teeth (NT) with those who had less than 20 NT, 2) to compare the OHRQoL of these patients who had at least 4 posterior occluding pairs (POP) with those who had less than 4 POP. 240 Thai elderly patients of Graduate Prosthodontic Clinic at Faculty of Dentistry, Chulalongkorn University were interviewed about general information, medical history and dental history, and evaluated OHRQoL by using OIDP. We counted number of functional NT and number of POP by using shimstock film. The results showed that the subjects with at least 20 NT had more OHRQoL than those with less than 20 NT significantly, and the subjects with at least 4 POP had more OHRQoL than those with less than 4 POP significantly. Furthermore, the subjects with at least 20 NT and at least 4 POP and those with less than 20 NT and at least 4 POP had better OHRQoL than those with less than 20 NT and less than 4 POP. These results indicated that we should consider the effect of the number of NT plus the number of POP on the OHRQoL, not only the number of NT or only the number of POP, because both number of NT and number of POP affect the OHRQoL