Bamford Centre for Mental Health and Wellbeing, Ulster University, Coleraine, Northern Ireland.
Administrative Data Research Centre Northern Ireland (ADRC-NI), Belfast, Northern Ireland.
J Ment Health. 2024 Aug;33(4):474-480. doi: 10.1080/09638237.2022.2069722. Epub 2022 May 10.
Oral health of people with severe mental illness (SMI) remains an important public health issue, despite evidence pointing suboptimal dental health outcomes in this population.
We test the hypotheses that individuals with SMI have lower contact with dental services and higher levels of fillings and extractions. We also examine effect modification by age-group.
We used linked administrative data from general practitioner (GP), hospital and dental records to examine dental service use and treatments (extractions, fillings, crowns and x-rays) among the Northern Ireland hospital population between January 2015 and November 2019 ( = 798,564).
After adjusting for available socio-demographic characteristics, analysis indicated lower levels of dental service use (OR = 0.80, 95% CI = 0.77, 0.84), including lower likelihood of fillings (OR = 0.81, 0.77, 0.84) and x-rays (OR = 0.77, 0.74, 0.81), but higher levels of extractions (OR = 1.23, 1.18, 1.29) among patients with SMI. We also found effect modification by age-group, with older individuals with SMI less likely to have each of the four dental treatments.
We suggest that in the general area of physical healthcare for people with SMI, oral healthcare is neglected. There is a need for improved understanding of the barriers to routine care and treatment, and development of psychoeducational interventions.
尽管有证据表明精神疾病患者（SMI）的口腔健康状况不佳，但他们的口腔健康仍然是一个重要的公共卫生问题。
我们检验了以下假设，即精神疾病患者与牙科服务的接触较少，补牙和拔牙的比例较高。我们还检查了年龄组的调节作用。
我们使用来自全科医生（GP）、医院和牙科记录的链接行政数据，来检查 2015 年 1 月至 2019 年 11 月期间北爱尔兰医院患者的牙科服务使用情况和治疗（拔牙、补牙、牙冠和 X 光）。
在调整了可用的社会人口特征后，分析表明牙科服务的使用水平较低（OR=0.80，95%CI=0.77，0.84），包括补牙（OR=0.81，0.77，0.84）和 X 光（OR=0.77，0.74，0.81）的可能性较低，但拔牙（OR=1.23，1.18，1.29）的可能性较高。我们还发现了年龄组的调节作用，年龄较大的精神疾病患者接受四种牙科治疗的可能性较小。
我们认为，在精神疾病患者的一般身体保健领域，口腔保健被忽视了。需要更好地了解常规护理和治疗的障碍，并开发心理教育干预措施。
