Maeda Claudia Y, Serrano Rafael V, Campos Luana, Palma Luiz F, Marcucci Marcelo
Stomatology and Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Center, Hospital Heliópolis, São Paulo - SP, Brazil.
Graduate Dentistry Program, Ibirapuera University, São Paulo - SP, Brazil.
Natl J Maxillofac Surg. 2024 Jan-Apr;15(1):36-39. doi: 10.4103/njms.njms_119_22. Epub 2024 Mar 19.
Mental distress is highly reported in cancer patients, resulting in anxiety and depression most of the time. Both conditions, in turn, are recognized to be related to dental fear in adults; however, there are no studies on patients suffering from head and neck cancer. Thus, the present study aimed to investigate whether newly diagnosed patients with head and neck cancer are more prone to self-reported dental fear.
This dual-center cross-sectional study was conducted with 25 healthy outpatients and 25 patients with a recent diagnosis of head and neck cancer, all requiring dental care. The patients were informed at the first appointment about their dental therapy planning and the Brazilian Portuguese Version of the Dental Fear Survey (DFS) questionnaire was then applied after appropriate instructions.
The DFS total scores did not differ statistically between the groups (Mann-Whitney U test, = 0,120) but the Cancer Group presented a slightly higher mean score (32.2 ± 10.0) than the Control Group (30.0 ± 14.2).
Within the limitations of this study, newly diagnosed patients with head and neck cancer and healthy individuals seem to experience similar self-reported dental fear.
癌症患者中精神痛苦的报告率很高，多数情况下会导致焦虑和抑郁。反过来，这两种情况都被认为与成年人的牙科恐惧有关；然而，尚无关于头颈癌患者的研究。因此，本研究旨在调查新诊断的头颈癌患者是否更容易出现自我报告的牙科恐惧。
这项双中心横断面研究对25名健康门诊患者和25名最近诊断为头颈癌的患者进行，所有患者均需要牙科护理。在首次就诊时告知患者其牙科治疗计划，然后在给予适当指导后应用巴西葡萄牙语版的牙科恐惧调查问卷（DFS）。
两组之间DFS总分无统计学差异（曼-惠特尼U检验，P = 0.120），但癌症组的平均得分（32.2±10.0）略高于对照组（30.0±14.2）。
在本研究的局限性内，新诊断的头颈癌患者和健康个体似乎经历相似的自我报告的牙科恐惧。
