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Assessment of dentally related functional competency for older adults with cognitive impairment-a survey for special-care dental professionals
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Assessment of dentally related functional competency for older adults with cognitive impairment-a survey for special-care dental professionals

Xi Chen and Jennifer J.J Clark
Special care in dentistry, Vol.33(2), pp.48-55
03/2013
DOI: 10.1111/scd.12005
PMCID: PMC3894116
PMID: 23451924
url
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/3894116View
Open Access

Abstract

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.
older adults functional competency cognitive impairment

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