Oral Health Project for the Elderly Launched
By Sun Jiejing
The District Dental Diseases Prevention Institute has recently tried to launch the oral health management and optimization project for the community elderly at the North Bund Sub-district, to check oral health and establish the corresponding health files for nearly 100 community elderly over 60 years old.
It is learned from the North Bund Community Health Service Center a few days ago that the community residents complete the information registration and questionnaire survey in streams, and take oral health examination through the dentists from the Institute.
According to Mr. Shen, he obviously feels that the mouth is not as good as before in the two years with age, sometimes he can feel the teeth shaking while chewing. Upon examination, the dentist finds that Mr. Shen has tooth loss and other oral problems, and Mr. Shen answers that the tooth has been missing for two years.
In fact, there are a lot of old people like Mr. Shen during the examination in the morning. It is reported that tooth loss not only affects facial beauty, but also will cause tilt and migration of the remaining teeth, and even cause gingival atrophy, periodontal ligament edema and other problems if not repaired in time, thus affecting normal chewing ability. "When people get older, the digestive function declines, and it can cause other diseases if people don't have fine chewing ability. Therefore, we recommend timely repair to the elderly with tooth loss," said Ding Guowei, Director of the Institute.
In addition to tooth loss, periodontitis and dental caries are common oral diseases for the community elderly. According to the 4th national oral health epidemiological survey, the elderly in Shanghai are poor in oral health, with over 90% rate of having caries and unhealthy dental periphery, but only 11.4% rate of getting diagnosis and treatment.
Therefore, the Institute has taken the lead in carrying out pilot projects at the North Bund Sub-district since this year, and finds out the main factors affecting their oral health by implementing oral health examinations for the community elderly over 60 years old, in a bid to further improve their oral health. Besides, the project will be launched at other sub-districts and elderly-care institutions in Hongkou, to gradually benefit more people.