Oral Health in nursing homes: education for staff and residents

All the evidence relates to care homes and there is hardly any evidence for any other setting.

9 trials were included in this Cochrane review of oral health education & training for care home residents & staff . These trials provided insufficient evidence from which to draw evidence about the effects of the interventions so more high quality studies are needed.

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Oral health advice for people with serious mental illness: lack of evidence about effectiveness

The research found that mindfulness helped more with the negative symptoms of schizophrenia

This Cochrane review update of oral health advice for patients with serious mental illness only included 3 RCTs. The identified studies were of low to moderate quality providing limited evidence to support decision making about the effectiveness of oral health advice for people with serious mental illness.

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Oral health promotion in dental practices

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44 studies were included in the review of oral health promotion in dental practice that was undertaken to the recent NICE guidance on this topic. The results of this review suggest that the psychology of behaviour change is the key to oral health promotion and greater emphasis on teaching oral health professionals about health psychology would make oral health promotion in the dental surgery more effective.

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Oral health promotion during pregnancy: little evidence available

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This review of oral health promotion in pregnancy included 7 studies with the majority (5) focused on improving knowledge. The description of the interventions was generally vague and just one was based on a recognised health behaviour theory.

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The use of motivational interviewing to improve oral health has potential but needs more research

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The use of motivational interviewing is increasing in dentistry and the recent SIGN guideline (Dental Elf  18th March 2014)  recommended that  oral health promotion interventions should be based on recognised health behaviour theory and models such as motivational interviewing. The aim of this review was to analyze the effectiveness of motivational interviewing in changing oral [read the full story…]

Limited evidence on the benefit of providing oral healthcare education to care home nurses on their attitude and their oral hygiene care skills

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Oral care is an important element of care for older people in care homes as oral health is often poor and can deteriorate rapidly causing pain discomfort and impacting on nutrition and quality of life.  With growing numbers of older people this is an area of increasing demand. This aim of the review was to [read the full story…]

Review suggests that motivational interviewing may have potential for improving oral health

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Good oral health can be achieved and maintained by compliance with preventive and curative measures and effective self-care. However, adherence to positive behaviours such as toothbrushing, interdental cleaning, smoking cessation and good dietary habits can be variable.  Traditional approaches of patient education revolve around disseminating information and normative advice.  Increasingly the use of motivational interviewing [read the full story…]

Oral Health Care of People with Learning Disabilities – updated guidance

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Updated Clinical Guidelines and Integrated Care Pathways for the Oral Health Care of People with Learning Disabilities are now available from the British Society for Disability and Oral Health (BSDH). These guidelines were originally a joint
 initiative between the Development Group
 for Community Dental Practice of the Faculty of Dental Surgery of The Royal College [read the full story…]

Implementation of an oral health care protocol led to short term improvements in care home residents

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With an increasing proportion of the population living longer and retaining their teeth into old age ensuring that they are maintained in good oral health is important. However,the literature indicates that the oral health of older people in care homes is poor.  The aim of this study was to assess the effectiveness of an Oral [read the full story…]

Tailored approaches to oral health education for non surgical periodontal treatment are cost effective

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This cost effectiveness study is based on a data from a randomised controlled trial published by Jönsson et al (2010), that trial compared an individually tailored oral health educational programme (ITOHEP) on periodontal health with a standard oral health educational programme. and found, ITOHEP intervention in combination with scaling is preferable to the standard programme [read the full story…]