Saracutu Ovidiu Ionut, Bracci Alessandro, Val Matteo, Colonna Anna, Ferrari Marco, Manfredini Daniele
Department of Medical Biotechnologies, School of Dentistry, University of Siena, 53100 Siena, Italy.
Department of Neurosciences, School of Dentistry, University of Padova, 35128 Padova, Italy.
J Oral Facial Pain Headache. 2025 Mar;39(1):134-140. doi: 10.22514/jofph.2025.013. Epub 2025 Mar 12.
The evolution of concepts that have featured the last decade in the field of bruxism led to the necessity of providing clinicians and researchers with adequate tools for the assessment of bruxism, such as the Standardized Tool for the Assessment of Bruxism (STAB) and the BruxScreen. The former is a multidimensional evaluation tool for the evaluation of bruxism status, while the latter is an instrument that could potentially find its applicability in large-scale epidemiological research projects for screening purposes. However, both tools lack the evaluation of orofacial symptoms at awakening, which can be predictive of temporomandibular disorders (TMDs) pain intensity and prognosis. The aim of this paper is to discuss the development of a novel tool, the OroFacial Awakening Symptoms Questionnaire (OFASQ). This questionnaire could be integrated into the STAB to investigate the presence of orofacial symptoms upon awakening and enhance knowledge of the relationship between sleep-time bruxism activities and potential clinical consequences. The OFASQ consists of a preliminary screening question about the presence or absence of a series of orofacial symptoms upon awakening and five items that evaluate the amount of pain and impairment they cause.
For pilot testing, the OFASQ was administered to a diverse group of 85 subjects, including dental practitioners of various specialties, postgraduate and undergraduate dentistry students and patients.
Following the face validity and pilot testing phase, it emerged that OFASQ could represent a valid tool for quantifying the intensity and severity of orofacial symptoms upon awakening in everyday clinical practice.
The OFASQ tool is considered ready for more in-depth clinical testing. The authors do not exclude the possibility of minor editing to the tool following further, more in-depth tests.
过去十年磨牙症领域概念的演变使得有必要为临床医生和研究人员提供评估磨牙症的适当工具，如磨牙症评估标准化工具（STAB）和磨牙症筛查工具（BruxScreen）。前者是用于评估磨牙症状态的多维评估工具，而后者是一种可能适用于大规模流行病学研究项目进行筛查的工具。然而，这两种工具都缺乏对觉醒时口面部症状的评估，而这些症状可预测颞下颌关节紊乱病（TMDs）的疼痛强度和预后。本文旨在讨论一种新型工具——口面部觉醒症状问卷（OFASQ）的开发。该问卷可纳入STAB中，以调查觉醒时口面部症状的存在情况，并增进对睡眠时磨牙症活动与潜在临床后果之间关系的了解。OFASQ包括一个关于觉醒时一系列口面部症状是否存在的初步筛查问题，以及五个评估这些症状所导致的疼痛程度和功能损害的项目。
为进行试点测试，OFASQ被应用于85名不同的受试者，包括各专业的牙科医生、牙科研究生和本科生以及患者。
在表面效度和试点测试阶段之后，结果表明OFASQ可能是在日常临床实践中量化觉醒时口面部症状强度和严重程度的有效工具。
OFASQ工具被认为已准备好进行更深入的临床测试。作者不排除在进一步更深入测试后对该工具进行小的编辑修改的可能性。
