Clinical Research Directory

Nutritional Intervention for Older Adults With Complete Dentures

The purpose of this clinical trial is to test a nutritional intervention. This study helps older adults who wear complete removable dentures improve their health. The main questions the study aims to answer are: * What are the participants life experiences living with complete dentures before the intervention? * Does the intervention improve the diet quality of the participants? * Does the intervention improve nutritional status of the participants? * Does the intervention improve chewing performance and muscle strength? * Does the intervention increase the thickness of the masticatory muscles? * Does the intervention improve stress and muscle health markers in saliva? * Does the intervention improve cognitive performance and oral health-related quality of life? * Does the intervention improve cerebral blood flow? The study will include a total of 40 participants, who will be assigned to two groups. One group of 20 participants will receive the nutritional intervention, while the other group of 20 participants will maintain their usual diet during the study period. This comparison will allow the investigators to assess the effectiveness of the intervention. Participants will: * Take part in a personal interview about their life experience with dentures. * Follow a dietary guide with recommendations on specific food textures for six months. * Receive personalized nutritional counseling and participate in healthy cooking workshops. * Use a custom-built mobile application to access the educational content of the nutritional guide, view instructional videos uploaded biweekly, and receive automated reminder notifications. * Attend clinical follow-up assessments, including chewing performance, muscle assessment, saliva markers, assessment of diet quality and nutritional status, cognitive tests, and oral health-related quality of life. * Complete these assessments at three main time points: baseline, 3 months, and 6 months.

Cognitive Changes and Neural Correlates After Rehabilitation of Masticatory Function in Elderly -an Intervention Study

Today in elderly tooth loss and loss of oral function is widespread, but it is an underexplored modifiable risk factor potentially contributing to the development of dementia. In this interventional study a "cause-effect" relationship between mastication and cognition in humans will be investigated. A total of eighty (80) participants, 65-80 years of age, indicated for prosthodontic rehabilitation will be randomly assigned to either the experimental or the control group. Participants will be randomized into two different groups, measurements are going to be conducted before and after prosthetic rehabilitation. The difference between the two groups is that the control group are going to do two measurements before undergoing the rehabilitation, this to control for the test-re-test effect. The aim with this study is to determine if the rehabilitation of chewing function will cause changes in the neurocognitive assessments of episodic memory and learning.

Validation and Evaluation of the Mastication Function in Adults: The Functional Six-minute Mastication Test (F-6MMT).

Temporomandibular Disorders (TMD) encompass various conditions that affect the temporomandibular joint and associated tissues, often causing or being associated with other symptoms such as jaw pain, myofascial pain, neck pain, and headaches. TMDs are classified according to the DC/TMD instrument in which the joint and pain axes are evaluated. However, there is no evaluation of mandibular function, and TMDs can result in a decrease in jaw strength and resistance. This leads to an increase in the chewing fatigue. Reliable and time-effective diagnostic methods for evaluating masticatory function are crucial in the clinical setting because of the high prevalence of TMD. Chewing efficiency is essential for food preparation and nutrient absorption, and muscle fatigue is a common problem affecting chewing ability. Despite this, there is a lack of validated tests to evaluate chewing fatigue in patients with TMD, which makes its consideration unnoticed in clinical practice. The modified six-minute functional chewing test (F-6MMT) was proposed as a tool to evaluate chewing ability and fatigue in patients with TMD. This test is an adaptation of a previously designed test in which subjects with mitochondrial pathology were evaluated; however, the subjects were not instructed to perform functional chewing during the test. In this version, modifications are added so that the test is as functional as possible, allowing chewing to be evaluated in a standardized way, and cut-off points established between healthy subjects and subjects with TMD in terms of chewing capacity in general and fatigue in particular. This study will follow standardized reporting guidelines and recruit participants from diverse clinical settings.