Oral Health Status and Treatment Needs of In-Patients of a Nigerian Psychiatric Hospital

Abstract

Background: Mental disorders have been reported to increase the risk to neglect of oral care.

Objective: To determine the oral health and treatment needs of psychiatric in-patients and compare with non-psychiatric patients.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional study conducted at the Federal Neuro-psychiatric Hospital, Yaba, Lagos and Lagos University Teaching Hospital, Idi Araba, Lagos. A structured questionnaire was administered by investigators to the two groups of participants’ case group (psychiatric patient) and the control group (dental patient with no psychiatric history). This included mini international neuropsychiatry interview (M.IN.I) questionnaire to ascertain the diagnoses. Other information sought included missing teeth, retained teeth, carious teeth and tooth wear lesions were noted during oral examination.

Results: A total of 167 participants were seen (81 were in the control group and 86 in the case group). Age range was from 18-90 years. The mean age was 41.44±14.98 years. All the participants (2.99%) with retained root were in case group. The majority (52.3%) of the participants in case group were dentate (p=0.001). The control group had the highest proportion of participants with good oral hygiene (p= 0.09). Carious teeth (p =0.33) and the number of teeth affected by tooth wear lesion were found to more in the case group (p= 0.02).

Conclusion: Psychiatric patients had poor oral health compared to non-psychiatric patients. There was also a higher restorative and surgical treatment need in psychiatric patients.

Keywords: oral, health, hygiene, caries, psychiatric