Impact of Periodontal Diseases on OHRQoL in Obese Population

Objective: Recent studies have shown that obesity is associated with periodontal diseases and periodontal diseases have an impact on quality of life.  It is anticipated that obese population will have higher prevalence of periodontal diseases; and their oral health related quality of life (OHRQoL) may be equally affected. The objective of this study is to investigate the impact of periodontal diseases on OHRQoL in obese Malaysian population. Method: This is a cross sectional study. Ethical approval was obtained (MEC96223). A convenience sampling was used to select the sample. The sample in this study was obese population; defined as individuals with BMI≥27.5 kg/m² (WHO 1997). The study involved full mouth periodontal examination and OHIP-14 questionnaire. Periodontal disease was categorized following case definition for periodontal diseases based on probing depth (PD) and clinical attachment loss (AL) as defined by Eke et al2012. The OHIP-14 was analyzed by computing two parameters; (1) prevalence of impact i.e. percentage of participants reporting ≥ 1 impacts “very often/often” and (2) severity of impact i.e. sum of response code for 14 items; range from 14-70. Lower values indicate higher impact. Univariate analysis and Ancova were used to analyse OHRQoL in relation to periodontal disease status. SPSS version 20 was used. Results: A total of 165 obese participants, mean age 43.9 (SD 8.90) participated. The prevalence of periodontal diseases was estimated as 73.9%. Overall prevalence of OHRQoL was 64.8%, mean severity score of 55.3 (SD 9.03). Univariate analysis suggested periodontal diseases was significantly linked to OHRQoL, in terms of functional limitation (p<0.05) and psychological disability (p<0.05). Periodontal diseases had an impact on one or more aspect of OHRQoL after controlling for age, gender, smoking and alcohol intake. Conclusion: Periodontal diseases were associated with a negative impact on OHRQoL of a convenient sample of obese Malaysians in terms of functional limitation and psychological disability.