Improving Oral Hygiene in Institutionalised Elderly by Educating Their Caretakers in Bangalore City, India: a Randomised Control Trial

BACKGROUND The population of older people, as well as the number of dependent older people, is steadily increasing; those unable to live independently at home are being cared for in a range of settings. Practical training for nurses and auxiliary care staff has frequently been recommended as a way of improving oral health care for functionally dependent elderly. The aim was improve oral hygiene in institutionalized elderly in Bangalore city by educating their caregivers. METHODS The study is a cluster randomized intervention trial with an elderly home as unit of randomization in which 7 out of 65 elderly homes were selected. Oral health knowledge of caregivers was assessed using a pre-tested pro forma and later oral-health education was provided to the caregivers of the study group. Oral hygiene status of elderly residents was assessed by levels of debris, plaque of dentate and denture plaque, and denture stomatitis of denture wearing residents, respectively. Oral-health education to the caregivers of control group was given at the end of six months. RESULTS There was significant improvement in oral-health knowledge of caregivers from the baseline and also a significant reduction of plaque score from baseline score of 3.17 ± 0.40 to 1.57 ± 0.35 post-intervention (p < .001), debris score 2.87 ± 0.22 to 1.49 ± 0.34 (p < .001), denture plaque score 3.15 ± 0.47 to 1.21 ± 0.27 (p < .001), and denture stomatitis score 1.43 ± 0.68 to 0.29 ± 0.53 (p < .001). CONCLUSIONS The result of the present study showed that there was a significant improvement in the oral-health knowledge among the caregivers and oral-hygiene status of the elderly residents.