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
. 2017 Jul 26;18(1):63.
doi: 10.1186/s12889-017-4609-9.

Self-reported oral and general health in relation to socioeconomic position

Magnus Hakeberg  1 , Ulla Wide Boman  2
Affiliations

Self-reported oral and general health in relation to socioeconomic position

Magnus Hakeberg et al. BMC Public Health. .

Erratum in

  • Erratum to: BMC Public Health, Vol. 18.
    [No authors listed] [No authors listed] BMC Public Health. 2017 Sep 22;17(1):736. doi: 10.1186/s12889-017-4709-6. BMC Public Health. 2017. PMID: 28938882 Free PMC article. No abstract available.

Abstract

Background: During the past two decades, several scientific publications from different countries have shown how oral health in the population varies with social determinants. The aim of the present study was to explore the relationship between self-reported oral and general health in relation to different measures of socioeconomic position.

Methods: Data were collected from a randomly selected sample of the adult population in Sweden (n = 3500, mean age 53.4 years, 53.1% women). The response rate was 49.7%. Subjects were interviewed by telephone, using a questionnaire including items on self-reported oral and general health, socioeconomic position and lifestyle.

Results: A significant gradient was found for both oral and general health: the lower the socioeconomic position, the poorer the health. Socioeconomic position and, above all, economic measures were strongly associated with general health (OR 3.95) and with oral health (OR 1.76) if having an income below SEK 200,000 per year. Similar results were found in multivariate analyses controlling for age, gender and lifestyle variables.

Conclusions: For adults, there are clear socioeconomic gradients in self-reported oral and general health, irrespective of different socioeconomic measures. Action is needed to ensure greater equity of oral and general health.

Keywords: Health; Oral health; Socioeconomic status; Survey.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Ethical consent to perform the study was obtained for the Regional Ethical review board Gothenburg, Reg. No. 801–12. All participants gave their informed consent to their interviewer verbally, due to the study design using the telephone interview as format for data collection.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

References

    1. Armfield JM, Mejia GC, Jamieson LM. Socioeconomic and psychosocial correlates of oral health. Int Dent J. 2013;63:202–209. doi: 10.1111/idj.12032. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Finlayson TL, Williams DR, Siefert K, Jackson JS, Nowjack-Raymer R. Oral health disparities and psychosocial correlates of self-rated oral health in the National Survey of American life. Am J Public Health. 2010;100(Suppl 1):S246–S255. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2009.167783. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Guarnizo-Herreno CC, Watt RG, Pikhart H, Sheiham A, Tsakos G. Socioeconomic inequalities in oral health in different European welfare state regimes. J Epidemiol Community Health. 2013;67:728–735. doi: 10.1136/jech-2013-202714. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Luchi CA, Peres KG, Bastos JL, Peres MA. Inequalities in self-rated oral health in adults. Rev Saude Publica. 2013;47:740–751. doi: 10.1590/S0034-8910.2013047004364. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Sabbah W, Tsakos G, Chandola T, Sheiham A, Watt RG. Social gradients in oral and general health. J Dent Res. 2007;86:992–996. doi: 10.1177/154405910708601014. - DOI - PubMed