Clinical Research Directory

Experience and Understanding of the Mouth, Oral Health and Function Amongst Adults With Disabilities and Complex Health Conditions.

Sponsor: University Hospital, Clermont-Ferrand

Summary

Oral health is the one of the commonest causes of health problems in the world, with almost all individuals suffering from reduced oral health at some stage over their life span. As such, oral health is a major public health issue and a major consumer of health spending. Poor oral health results in pain, infection, structural degradation, functional restrictions in chewing, swallowing and speech, change in facial appearance, social stigma, altered body image, and reduced capacity to participate in social events, amongst others. Global problems of human functioning, disability, health and environment in turn affect oral status in many complex ways (for example, ability to maintain oral hygiene, nutritional restrictions, neuromotor incapacity, dysphagia, ability to access and cooperate with treatment, etc). Disability arises from a social environment that fails to enable everyone to access it regardless of his or her impairment. Disabilities are thus socially created and not dependent on the individual's type or location of impairment. There is currently very limited qualitative research exploring perceptions of the mouth, or oral health within a social environment, from the perspective of disabled adults. No universal, holistic, comprehensive tool exists to describe oral health, the functional impact of oral health, and the environmental factors influencing oral health within the biopsychosocial model. It has been suggested that a framework for such an instrument may be supplied by the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF: World Health Organisation, 2001) This research seeks to address these gaps by describing perceptions of the mouth from the perspective of adults with disabilities and complex health conditions, and by linking this qualitative data to the ICF in order to assess the feasibility of using the ICF to conceptualise oral health. Adults with disabilities and complex health conditions were chosen for this ICF core set preliminary study as existing literature suggests that these respondents would accumulate not only a high level of oral health need but also experience high impact of functioning and environment on oral health.

Official title: Experience and Understanding of the Mouth, Oral Health and Function Amongst

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