Oral treatment need and oral treatment intention in a population enrolled in long-term care in nursing homes and home care

Abstract

The aim of the study was to evaluate the realistic oral treatment need in a population in southern Sweden enrolled in long-term care (LTC), in nursing homes (NH), or home care (HC), taking into consideration treatment intention. Every third individual enrolled in LTC was selected after proportionally stratifying a total of 866 subjects according to gender. Of these, 732 (85%) were available for a simple clinical oral health evaluation in their own homes. Dental status, oral mucosal status, oral hygiene status, oral mucosal inflammation, and oral mucosal friction were assessed by observational examinations; suspected malignancies were also noted. Oral treatment need was expressed in accordance with the Treatment Need Index (TNI) as no, minor, major, or urgent, while treatment intention was expressed in accordance with the Treatment Intention Index (TII) as the aim to relieve, delay, maintain, or improve. The rationale for using the TII is to offer subjects in this generally frail population oral treatment at an appropriate level, taking their medical condition into consideration. It was found that 61% of the sample had a need not just for an oral health evaluation but also for additional dental treatment, 31% to be accomplished by prophylactic and 30% by reparative or emergency measures; only 1% were estimated to be in urgent need. Furthermore, one manifest and one suspected oral malignancy were found. The results indicate that realistic oral treatment need, guided by the examiner's estimation of the appropriate treatment intention, is modest in this population, but that regular oral screening is mandatory.