Clinical judgement and patients' evaluation of complete dentures five years after treatment. A follow-up study.

An investigation of 39 complete denture wearers five year after receiving new dentures showed that the great majority of the patients were satisfied with their dentures. In the examiner's opinion, 60 per cent of the dentures were in need of corrections or replacement. A positive, but not statistically significant, correlation between the subjective and objective evaluation of the dentures was found. Although the patients were strongly advised not to wear their dentures at night, in order to preserve the denture-bearing tissue, most patients preferred to wear the dentures also at night. The patients had also been told to contact the clinic at least every two years for a clinical check-up, but more than half of the patients had not been in contact with a dentist during the five-year period. Those who had been to a dentist had, in all cases, done so because of acute problems. It is concluded that the agreement between patients' and examiners' opinions about the function of complete dentures is poor, and that denture acceptance is related to many variables. No single variable has a decisive effect on denture acceptance but the subjective opinion of the fit of the upper denture seemed to be the most important one. It is also stressed that a regular recall system is important for complete denture wearers. It is likely that if these patients had been seen regularly, minor corrections to the dentures could have been made, thus preventing or delaying the deterioration of the dentures.