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Assessment of dentally related functional competency for older adults with cognitive impairment—a survey for special‐care dental professionals
Author(s) -
Chen Xi,
Clark Jennifer J.J.
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
special care in dentistry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.328
H-Index - 41
eISSN - 1754-4505
pISSN - 0275-1879
DOI - 10.1111/scd.12005
Subject(s) - medicine , geriatric dentistry , dental care , cognition , population , family medicine , gerontology , psychiatry , oral health , environmental health
This survey was to study whether and how dental professional assess dental‐related function in older adults with cognitive impairment (OACI). An invitation was sent to 525 special‐care dental professionals, followed by a reminder in 2 weeks. Thirteen percent of the targeted participants completed the survey. Among them, 88% completed a hospital dentistry, geriatric dentistry, or other postgraduate training program. Nearly 70% of the respondents considered somewhat to very difficult to assess dentally related function; 45% did not ever or did not regularly assess dental‐related function for OACI. Dental‐related functional assessments were often based on a subjective, unstructured approach. Only 6% of the respondents routinely used standard instruments to assess the patients’ function. These results indicate that an objective functional assessment based on a standardized instrument has not been routinely incorporated into dental care for OACI, raising concerns for quality of care in this vulnerable population.