Impacto das condições bucais na qualidade de vida de adolescentes brasileiros: um estudo populacional

Abstract

The oral health related life of quality of childrens and adolescents has been a frequent issue in national and international literature. Especially due to the fact children and adolescents are able to give precise information about their oral health. Several instruments have been proposed to analyze their oral health perception. Amongst them, the most used has been the Oral Health Related Quality of Life (OHRQoL), a set of instruments developed in Canada which evaluates the childrens and adolescents perception of their oral health (Child Perceptions Questionnaire - CPQ), the parents and legally responsible persons report on their childrens oral health (Parental-Caregiver Perceptions Questionnaire - P-CPQ) as well as the childrens and adolescents oral health impact in the family (Family Impact Scale - FIS). The CPQ evaluated the childrens and adolescents oral health in many world regions such as New Zealand, Australia, Denmark, Saudi Arabia, China, the United Kingdom, etc. However, the use of this instrument in a random and representative sample was fulfilled in a few places. In this current cross-sectional study, done with representative sample of adolescents (1.612) between 11-14 years old of a big Brazilian city in southwest region, using the CPQ 11-14 ISF: 16 instrument, it was detected that some adolescents oral conditions can show biopsycosocial impacts in their everyday lives. Among these conditions, we can highlight the malocclusion and dental caries, two of the main problems of the Brazils dentistry public health. The malocclusion has a negative impact in the adolescents life quality mainly due to aesthetics. The presence of dental caries brings inconvenient aspects such as pain, difficulty of eating and phonation. These alterations impacts are so clear that, besides the symptoms manifestation, the adolescents stop making social relationships or become more introverted very often. The mothers report on their childrens oral health condition can be different from the perception these children have about their oral health condition themselves. Generally, the mothers are responsible for taking care of their children. In the 960 pairs (mothers-adolescents), using the instruments P-CPQ and CPQ 11-14 ISF:16 in a cross-sectional study, it was verified that mothers tend to minimize the oral health condition in the adolescents everyday life, while the adolescents realize in a more seriously way the impact of your oral health condition results in their everyday life. This could be explained by the fact that, at present, mothers have the tendency to spend a little time with their children due to several social appointments and her job. The Brazilian children and adolescents spend a long time at school and many of the presented impacts happen at school environment, far from the mothers eyes.