Oral health status of elderly people in Rome-Italy

Abstract

Background: Actually there is no survey on the oral health of elderly in Lazio region or in Rome. Study aims to assess the dental and oral health status and treatments needs of the elderly population in Rome in order to assess  need for care.  Materials and Methods: 316 non institutionalized patients all living in Rome underwent a complete oral and dental examination following the WHO's criteria. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS Inc, ver. 13.0, Chicago, IL, USA. A p-value of less than 0.05 was considered significant. Results: The prevalence of edentulousness was 4.4%. Missing teeth were 3346 (37,81%). After grouping patients by age (65-69, 70-74, 75-79, 80 and over) we found that only in the first group (65-69) women had a lower number (p<0.001) of missing teeth than men: women 359 (23,31%), men 393 (35,08%). Mean number of remaining teeth per subject was 17,41. Both genders in the mandible presented a greater number of teeth present (9.02 on average) than the maxilla (8.27 on average; p=0.002). Decayed, Missing, Filled Teeth index (DMFT index) was 14.65 (D:7,73%, M:81,57% and F:10,69%.). Regarding Community Periodontal Index (CPI) 14,5% of the sextants resulted healthy, 4.9% had gingival bleeding on probing, 20.7% had dental calculus, 17.0% periodontal pockets 4-5mm deep, 1.4% pockets 6 or more mm deep and 41.5% of the sextants were excluded. Conclusions: The findings illustrated a promising oral and dental health status compared to other European countries. The status of oral health was significantly better in women than in men in the first age group 65-69, increase in age results in a worsening of all indices.