Whitireia WelTec, Lower Hutt, New Zealand.
Department of Public Health, University of Otago, Wellington, New Zealand.
Gerodontology. 2022 Jun;39(2):187-196. doi: 10.1111/ger.12553. Epub 2021 Apr 4.
A small number of national studies have explored the barriers to older people accessing dental care; however, to date none have investigated older people's recommendations for overcoming these barriers.
Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 40 dentate older people (65 years and over) who resided in New Zealand's Otago region and received home-support. A joint inductive thematic analysis was undertaken, based on the constant comparative method.
Recommendations for boosting community-dwelling older people's access to dental care included publicly funding or subsiding the cost of dental care for older people, aligning the pension with the real cost of living, and making the environment at Work and Income less hostile and the emergency dental grant more readily available, making dental clinics more accessible, initiating domiciliary dental care, having mobile dental clinics visit neighbourhoods with high proportions of older people, as well as subsidised transport to the dental clinic. Other suggestions were having GPs, pharmacists and social workers emphasise oral health during appointments, along with dental education campaigns.
In order to boost the rates of dental care access among older New Zealanders who receive home support, multiple structural changes are necessary, but these should primarily focus on reducing the cost and increasing accessibility.
少数国家研究探讨了老年人获得牙科护理的障碍；然而，迄今为止，尚无研究调查老年人对克服这些障碍的建议。
对居住在新西兰奥塔哥地区并接受家庭支持的 40 名有牙老年人（65 岁及以上）进行了半结构化访谈。采用基于恒定性比较方法的联合归纳主题分析。
提高社区居住的老年人获得牙科护理的建议包括为老年人的牙科护理提供公共资金或补贴，使养老金与实际生活成本保持一致，使工作和收入环境不那么敌对，紧急牙科补助金更容易获得，使牙科诊所有更多的可及性，开展家庭牙科护理，让流动牙科诊所到老年人比例较高的社区就诊，以及补贴前往牙科诊所的交通费用。其他建议包括让全科医生、药剂师和社会工作者在预约时强调口腔健康，并开展牙科教育活动。
为了提高接受家庭支持的新西兰老年人口腔护理的利用率，需要进行多项结构性改革，但这些改革应主要侧重于降低成本和提高可及性。
