Oral Hygiene handled by elderly’s care givers: difficulty and facility

Objectives: This paper evaluates the oral hygiene practice handled by the elderly's caregivers in long term care philanthropic (PHIL) and private (PRIV) facilities. Their previous training and the period of their professional experience were considered. Methods: The evaluation was based on the information provided through interviews with 181 elderly's caregivers, divided into two groups: 98 from philanthropic facilities (PHIL) and 83 from private facilities (PRIV). For assessing data, a semi–structural questionnaire was used and the interviews were chosen by a systemic and aleatory selection. This work used the Q Square test (p<0,05), through the Epiinfo 6.0 program, to compare the available data. Results: Through the interviews, 52% of the care givers considered the handling of the elderly's oral hygiene easy, corresponding to 58,2% of the interviews from PHIL and 45,8% from PRIV facilities. There wasn't a statistical difference between these percentages (p>0,05). As a result of this study, it was noticed that the training of the elderly's caregivers as well as the period of their professional experience didn't interfere with their easy or difficult performance with elderly's oral ygiene in PHIL and PRIV facilities (p>0,05). Most of the care givers (70%) considered the elderly's resistance as the main difficulty in using the procedures of oral hygiene, while some of them mentioned different factors, such as the difficulty of handling (22% PHIL, 34% PRIV), personal problems and others (1%). Conclusions: Summing up, contrary to other studies, neither the care givers' professional experience nor their training of oral hygiene handling make such practice easier. The difficulties in elderly's oralhygiene practice, reported by the care givers,are mainly related to the elderly's own conditions.