Oral health status and oral health-related quality of life in pregnant women from socially deprived populations

Abstract

The aim of the present work was to explore whether there is a relationship between oral health status and oral health-related quality of life in pregnant women from socially deprived populations in Buenos Aires City. Eighty pregnant women (age 18-39 x = 25.19 +/- 6.56) in their 1st/2nd trimester were sampled from the population of women visiting a health center located in the south of Buenos Aires City for their pregnancy check-ups. The impact of oral disease was assessed using the Spanish validated version (López, 2006) of OHIP-49 (Slade and Spencer, 1994), which includes 49 items grouped into 7 domains. Each question has five possible answers, to which values ranging from 1 to 5 were assigned. To assess oral health status, 4 calibrated researchers performed a clinical examination and recorded: Gingival Index (Löe and Silness, 1963); depth on probing, clinical attachment level, bleeding on probing and DMFT discriminating its components. Variables were analyzed in the population as a whole and in groups regarding previous dental attention (presence of fillings). Statistical analysis included: Chi Square test to establish association between variables and t-test to compare groups. 93.75% of the patients showed clinical signs of gingivitis, 2.5% showed clinical signs of periodontitis. Mean DMFT was 12.24 +/- 6.48 (D/DMFT = 6.46 +/- 4.64; M/DMFT = 4.09 +/- 4.31; F/DMFT = 2.53 +/- 3.52); 73.3% of the patients had at least one missing tooth; 92.1% presented active caries lesions; 53.7% had at least one filling. Most frequent impacts were reported in the domains: psychological discomfort (59.9% = frequent concern about dental problems) and functional limitation (51.1% = frequent perception that "a tooth did not look good"). Oral health status and oral health-related quality of life showed no significant association. Domains involving functional limitation (p < 0.04) and physical disability (p < 0.01) showed higher levels of impact in the group of patients with previous dental care (presence of fillings). Oral health-related quality of life did not reflect health status; nevertheless, it may be an intervenient variable regarding demand for dental service.