A Structured Literature Review of Oral Health Needs Assessment.

Objectives: Assessing the oral health needs of a population is key to effective planning and commissioning of dental services, particularly for vulnerable and “at-risk” peoples. This work reviewed the available literature on conducting an oral health needs assessment covering vulnerable groups.
Methods: The following electronic databases; MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL and the Cochrane Library were searched from inception to June 2013, without language restrictions. Papers which described the conduct of oral health needs assessment (OHNA) in vulnerable groups from a population perspective were included. Papers identified as relevant were reviewed to identify data of relevance to the (OHNA) process.
Results: Of 1426 unique articles identified, 59 were deemed relevant for full review. The heterogeneity of the studies precluded numeric summary, so a narrative report was deemed most appropriate. Key findings were as follows. No publications described an Oral Health Needs Assessment which was taken forward via a strategy, implemented and evaluated. The majority of oral health needs assessments are conducted largely in the form of simple cross-sectional epidemiological surveys of dental caries prevalence. While socio-dental indicators have been extensively described, this has largely been in one-off studies and not as part of an on-going evaluated OHNA process. Access to dental care using simplistic measures of direct-line access were reported, as were more sophisticated forms of geographic information systems. Most interesting was a health equity audit approach, one of the few mechanisms suggested to address oral health inequalities within the OHNA process.
Conclusions: Evidence on a systematic approach to OHNA was lacking. This work was used to inform the development of National Public Health Guidance for Local Authorities on how to assess local needs as part of the oral health improvement agenda.