Assessment of unmet dental care needs in the urban and rural older adults: an interrupted time series analysis

Objectives: This study aims to provide essential data for developing dental health insurance policies by identifying changes in the rate of unmet dental care needs among older adults aged 65 to 70 years before and after implementing the policies. Methods: We used the Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHNES) from 2007 to 2022. We performed an interrupted time series analysis, with consideration of the intervention point (set in 2016), by dividing the participants into an experimental (urban older adults) and a control group (rural older adults). Results: The unmet dental care needs rate was 31.2% for urban and 34.3% for rural older adults. After the policy implementation, the trend of unmet dental care needs among urban older adults showed a decreasing tendency (-0.3%; 95% CI: -0.73 to 0.15, p=0.186), while it showed an increasing trend in rural areas (0.3%; 95% CI: -0.73 to 1.23, p=0.603). The difference in trends between the two groups after the policy implementation was -0.5% (95% CI: -1.62 to 0.54, p=0.308). Conclusions: Due to the lack of statistical significance, it is possible that external factors other than policy implementation influenced the results. Therefore, there is a need to continuously assess the impact of dental policies on unmet dental care needs.