Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2016 Feb 15:16:18.
doi: 10.1186/s12903-016-0176-1.

Brazilian immigrants' oral health literacy and participation in oral health care in Canada

Paola Calvasina  1   2 , Herenia P Lawrence  3 , Laurie Hoffman-Goetz  4 , Cameron D Norman  5
Affiliations

Brazilian immigrants' oral health literacy and participation in oral health care in Canada

Paola Calvasina et al. BMC Oral Health. .

Abstract

Background: Inadequate functional health literacy is a common problem in immigrant populations. The aim of this study was to investigate the association between oral (dental) health literacy (OHL) and participation in oral health care among Brazilian immigrants in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Methods: The study used a cross-sectional design and a convenience sample of 101 Brazilian immigrants selected through the snowball sampling technique. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and logistic regression modeling.

Results: Most of the sample had adequate OHL (83.1 %). Inadequate/marginal OHL was associated with not visiting a dentist in the preceding year (OR = 3.61; p = 0.04), not having a dentist as the primary source of dental information (OR = 5.55; p < 0.01), and not participating in shared dental treatment decision making (OR = 1.06; p = 0.05; OHL as a continuous variable) in multivariate logistic regressions controlling for covariates. A low average annual family income was associated with two indicators of poor participation in oral health care (i.e., not having visited a dentist in the previous year, and not having a dentist as regular source of dental information).

Conclusion: Limited OHL was linked to lower participation in the oral health care system and with barriers to using dental services among a sample of Brazilian immigrants. More effective knowledge transfer will be required to help specific groups of immigrants to better navigate the Canadian dental care system.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Ishikawa H, Yano E. Patient health literacy and participation in the health-care process. Health Expect. 2008;11:113–22. doi: 10.1111/j.1369-7625.2008.00497.x. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Schillinger D, Bindman A, Wang F, Stewart A, Piette J. Functional health literacy and the quality of physician-patient communication among diabetes patients. Patient Educ Couns. 2004;52:315–23. doi: 10.1016/S0738-3991(03)00107-1. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Mancuso CA, Rincon M. Asthma patients’ assessments of health care and medical decision-making: the role of health literacy. J Asthma. 2006;43:41–4. doi: 10.1080/02770900500447052. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Barragan M, Hicks G, Williams MV, Franco-Paredes C, Duffus W, del Rio C. Low health literacy is associated with HIV test acceptance. J Gen Intern Med. 2005;20:422–5. doi: 10.1111/j.1525-1497.2005.40128.x. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Chew LD, Bradley KA, Flum DR, Cornia PB, Koepsell TD. The impact of low health literacy on surgical practice. Am J Surg. 2004;188:250–3. doi: 10.1016/j.amjsurg.2004.04.005. - DOI - PubMed

Publication types