Oral condition, habits and treatment necessity of institutionalized elders in Araras (SP, Brazil)

The aim of this study was to check the oral condition of the elderly citizens from the city of Araras (Sao Paulo, Brazil), and to evaluate treatment needs for this population. 118 volunteers were interviewed and 112 were examined, all of them with age above 60 years. The research was accomplished through a previous 14 question questionnaire that evaluated the patient general health, besides verified the self-knowledge of their oral health in addition to an intraoral physical exam, observing the oral conditions of the patients. In order to verify cavities prevalence, it was used an advocated criterion and index by WHO. It was observed that the systemic diseases that presented most prevalence were insomnia (40,67%), followed by visual disturbances (36,44%) and arthritis (33,05%). In relation to the self-knowledge of the volunteers as to their oral condition, it was noticed that 90,67% of the individuals thought that oral condition does not affect their quality of life. With the intraoral exam, it was obtained a DMF-T media equals to 30,6 with the lost component contributing to 93,9% of the cavities prevalence value (p=28,7). This population requires special care focused on the oral health because besides having a high DMF-T, they also present inadequate oral health self-knowledge.