How Provision of Oral Health Care Affects the Risk of Respiratory Infections in Institutionalized Elderly Persons Requiring Full-time Care
Introduction
Due to aging, many elderly adults suffer a deterioration in physical capacity and mental acuity, rendering them unable to care for themselves in general and their oral health in particular. Researches show that respiratory pathogens reside in dental plaque (Russell, Boylan, Kaslick, Scannapieco, & Katz, 1999; Scannapieco, Stewart, & Mylotte, 1992), which is implicated in aspiration pneumonia (Kuyama, Sun, & Yamamoto, 2010). Aspiration pneumonia (AP) is defined as pneumonia resulting from aspiration of oropharyngeal contents (such as dental plaque mixed with saliva) into the lower respiratory …show more content…
The first theme is the elderly’s dependency for activities of daily living (ADL), while the second theme is oral plaque accumulation as a reservoir of respiratory pathogens. In this review of literature, oral care is defined as any effort to reduce oral plaque accumulation in both hard tissues (natural dentition and dentures) and soft tissues (for example, the tongue and cheeks). If dentists, dental hygienists or trained nursing staff are administering oral health care, it is referred to as professional oral health care (POHC). However, if relatives or, the patient themselves are the ones providing oral health care, this is considered non-POHC. An elderly is defined in this review as someone over 65 years of …show more content…
Only one study (Abe et al., 2001) compared the target population to community dwellers and different age groups while only two studies (Abe et al., 2001; Yoneyama et al., 2002) used objective plaque index scores to measure reduction in dental plaque. Future studies conducted on the topic of oral health and respiratory illness would benefit from an ethically designed methodology which compares the target population to the wider community of care-dependent elderly. In addition, night-time wearing of dentures among the care-dependent should be considered in future studies as reducing night-time wearing of dentures could also help reduce bacterial count. A quantitative design assessing denture wear, access to oral care, plaque scores, cultures, febrile days and other clinical markers of respiratory illness would help answer gaps in the four identified papers. Oral care providers must be cognisant of the risk of respiratory infections from dental plaque accumulation to help increase the quality of life of their care-dependent elderly
Introduction
Due to aging, many elderly adults suffer a deterioration in physical capacity and mental acuity, rendering them unable to care for themselves in general and their oral health in particular. Researches show that respiratory pathogens reside in dental plaque (Russell, Boylan, Kaslick, Scannapieco, & Katz, 1999; Scannapieco, Stewart, & Mylotte, 1992), which is implicated in aspiration pneumonia (Kuyama, Sun, & Yamamoto, 2010). Aspiration pneumonia (AP) is defined as pneumonia resulting from aspiration of oropharyngeal contents (such as dental plaque mixed with saliva) into the lower respiratory …show more content…
The first theme is the elderly’s dependency for activities of daily living (ADL), while the second theme is oral plaque accumulation as a reservoir of respiratory pathogens. In this review of literature, oral care is defined as any effort to reduce oral plaque accumulation in both hard tissues (natural dentition and dentures) and soft tissues (for example, the tongue and cheeks). If dentists, dental hygienists or trained nursing staff are administering oral health care, it is referred to as professional oral health care (POHC). However, if relatives or, the patient themselves are the ones providing oral health care, this is considered non-POHC. An elderly is defined in this review as someone over 65 years of …show more content…
Only one study (Abe et al., 2001) compared the target population to community dwellers and different age groups while only two studies (Abe et al., 2001; Yoneyama et al., 2002) used objective plaque index scores to measure reduction in dental plaque. Future studies conducted on the topic of oral health and respiratory illness would benefit from an ethically designed methodology which compares the target population to the wider community of care-dependent elderly. In addition, night-time wearing of dentures among the care-dependent should be considered in future studies as reducing night-time wearing of dentures could also help reduce bacterial count. A quantitative design assessing denture wear, access to oral care, plaque scores, cultures, febrile days and other clinical markers of respiratory illness would help answer gaps in the four identified papers. Oral care providers must be cognisant of the risk of respiratory infections from dental plaque accumulation to help increase the quality of life of their care-dependent elderly