OHIP in Patients With Extensive Tooth Wear After a Prosthetic Rehabilitation

Objectives: To assess change in oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) in patients with extensive tooth wear (TW) using the Oral Health Impact Profile 14 (OHIP-S14) before and after prosthetic rehabilitation with two different ceramic crown materials.
Methods: A total of 62 patients with severe TW (17 women, 45 men; mean age 44.8y; range 25-63y) were randomly assigned to two groups: a group treated with lithium disilicate (LD) crowns (n= 362) and the other group with translucent zirconia (TZ) crowns (n=351). Patients completed an OHIP-S14 questionnaire at baseline, after 1 month, and after several years (mean 72± 18.3 months, range 35-101 months). The paired t-test, effect size (EZ), Wilcoxon test, Pearson correlation test was used to examine differences. Statistical significance was set at p<0.05.
Results: Crown therapy significantly improved OHRQoL in 6 of 7 investigated areas: physical pain, psychological discomfort, handicap, physical disability, psychological disability, and social disability. The total mean score for all items decreased from 11.84 ± 9.158 to 6.97 ± 7.815 (p<0.001) with a moderate EZ (0.448). The mean OHIP score several years after treatment, compared to baseline, improved in all domains from 11.84 ± 9.158 at baseline to 4.28 ± 4.634 (p=0.000) with a large EZ (0.886). OHRQoL improved most significantly among men (p=0.000). The number of worn teeth and the age of the participants had no effect on the degree of improvement in QoL in patients with extensive TW.
Conclusions: Patients with extensive TW showed significant improvements in quality of life after ceramic crown rehabilitation. As patients use to have a different perspective from the clinicians and the extent of TW do not always justify an invasive prosthetic treatment, the use of such tools to assess patient’s complaints is important prior to and along with the prosthetic rehabilitation.