Changes in oral health in New South Wales1987-2006

Objectives:In 2004, the Centre for Oral Health Strategy was responsible for conducting the NSW component of the National Survey of Adult Oral Health 2004–06 in accordance with methods developed by the Australian Research Centre for Population Oral Health (ARCPOH) at the University of Adelaide, South Australia. The aim of this paper is to describe changes in oral health status and utilisation pattern for residents 15 and over in the state of New South Wales (NSW) since the previous survey in 1987 -88. Methods:We examined the distribution of dental disease and patterns of dental care within participant characteristics for the different time periods. Means and 95% confidence intervals were used to compare trends across survey years and within different subgroups. Results: In the 17 years to 2004\06, the prevalence of edentulism more than halved from 12.2 in 1987\88 to 5.5.The average decayed, missing and filled teeth per person decreased from 15.3 to 12.8. But greatest reduction has been in the mean number of teeth with untreated decay which halved from 1.4 t0 0.7 in 2004\06. The average number of missing teeth due to caries decreased from 7.4 to 4.9.The proportion of NSW adults who attended dental care increased from 52.7% to 60.3% during the 17 year period. Dental insurance remained stable with 49.8% insured in 1987\88 and 46.6 % in 2004\06. At both survey times the vast majority of adults had obtained their most recent dental care at a private practice 84.2 % in 1987\88 and 80.8% in 2004\06. There were increases in the number of NSW residents who perceived the need for extraction from 5.3% to 9.5%, and who perceived a need for filling which increased from 22.0% to 27.5%. However perceived need for dentures among NSW residents decreased from 8.3% to 7.1%. Conclusions: