Association between oral health, cognitive impairment and oral health-related quality of life

Abstract

Objective: Investigating oral health-related quality of life's (OH-QoL) relationship with cognitive state.

Background: Oral health affects OH-QoL and is poor in institutionalised and cognitively impaired people.

Material and methods: This was a cross-sectional study involving 215 institutionalised elderly (82.9 mean age), who were interviewed, examined and cognitively screened using the Pfeiffer test.

Results: Mean GOHAI score was 53.1; only 43.7% of the participants reported having a good OH-QoL. Needing help with dressing or washing (OR 2.14; p = 0.004), having one to nine teeth (OR 4.65; p ≥ 0.001), eight or less occluding pairs (OR 2.74; p = 0.002), one to three caries (OR 1.85; p = 0.005) and being cognitive impaired (OR 0.54; p = 0.034) were significantly associated with altered OH-QoL in bi-variate analysis. Being edentulous (OR 3.18; p = 0.0046), having 1-9 teeth (OR 2.62; p = 0.056) and presenting mild cognitive impairment (MCI) (OR 0.32; p = 0.016) appeared as predictive variables in logistic regression for having an altered OH-QoL.

Conclusions: Participants having MCI had significantly better GOHAI score than cognitively normal residents. Performing cognitive screening parallel to applying any OH-QoL instrument would make the results more reliable and would benefit cognitively impaired people.