Department of Periodontology, Hamdan Bin Mohammed College of Dental Medicine, Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Dubai Healthcare City, Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
Department of Periodontology, Faculty of Dentistry, Sir John Walsh Research Institute, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand.
Clin Exp Dent Res. 2024 Feb;10(1):e840. doi: 10.1002/cre2.840.
The coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic has caused disruption in the health behavior in many aspects of life. While hand hygiene was promoted as one of the precautionary measures to mitigate and contain COVID-19, oral health and smoking might have received less attention in the media campaigns. The aim of this study was to examine health behavioral changes in terms of oral home care habits, smoking, and perception of dental care during the COVID-19 pandemic.
An online survey was designed to assess oral home care, smoking habits, and attitude toward dental services of participants aged 18 years and older. The data were collected between September and November 2021. The strength of association between changes in oral home care habits, smoking, and attitude toward invasive/long dental procedures and each variable was measured by χ analysis. Estimates of relative risk were also calculated for all variables. Predictors of avoiding dental procedures were estimated by a binary logistic regression.
A total of 532 participants, based in the United Arab Emirates, took part in this online survey with a response rate of 88.7%. The age of the participants ranged between 18 and 67 with mean age of 34.9 ± 9.0 years. The majority of the participants have adopted changes in their routine oral home care habits, with 82.1% of them changing the toothbrush more frequently. Participants who changed their oral home care habits were more likely to have received sufficient information on the importance of maintaining oral health. Likewise, the changes in smoking habits were significantly associated with receiving information on the relationship between smoking and the severity of the COVID-19 (p < 0.001).
The findings showed that positive behavior toward oral home care and smoking was noticed during the pandemic particularly when public receives sufficient and up-to-date information.
新冠病毒病（COVID-19）大流行导致生活许多方面的健康行为受到干扰。虽然手部卫生被宣传为减轻和控制 COVID-19 的预防措施之一，但口腔卫生和吸烟可能在媒体宣传中受到较少关注。本研究旨在调查 COVID-19 大流行期间口腔家庭护理习惯、吸烟和对牙科护理的看法等方面的健康行为变化。
设计了一项在线调查，以评估 18 岁及以上参与者的口腔家庭护理习惯、吸烟习惯和对牙科服务的态度。数据收集于 2021 年 9 月至 11 月期间。使用 χ 检验测量口腔家庭护理习惯、吸烟习惯和对侵入性/长期牙科程序的态度变化与每个变量之间的关联强度。还计算了所有变量的相对风险估计值。通过二元逻辑回归估计避免牙科程序的预测因素。
共有 532 名基于阿拉伯联合酋长国的参与者参加了这项在线调查，响应率为 88.7%。参与者的年龄在 18 至 67 岁之间，平均年龄为 34.9±9.0 岁。大多数参与者已经改变了他们的日常口腔家庭护理习惯，其中 82.1%的人更频繁地更换牙刷。改变口腔家庭护理习惯的参与者更有可能获得关于维护口腔健康重要性的充分信息。同样，吸烟习惯的改变与收到关于吸烟与 COVID-19 严重程度之间关系的信息显著相关（p<0.001）。
研究结果表明，在大流行期间，特别是当公众获得充分和最新的信息时，人们对口腔家庭护理和吸烟的积极行为有所注意。
