Prevalence and Trends of Oral Diseases in Elderly Patients at Tripoli University Hospital: A 20-Year Retrospective Analysis

It is now well recognized that there has been a revolution in the age pyramid of many societies, and within a very short time, there will be more people over 60. This is because of a considerable increase in the expectation of life. The current study evaluated retrospectively the frequency and prevalence of elderly patients' lesions recorded from the Pathology Department and Oral Maxillofacial Department database of Tripoli University Hospital, Tripoli, Libya from 2002 to 2022 year. The total number of reports was 2366 biopsies. The cross-sectional study included patients aged 60 and over. An oral and maxillofacial pathologist revised all histopathologic diagnoses. The study used SPSS version 25 software for data management, and analysis, employed basic descriptive statistics and bivariate analysis to examine the relationship between oral lesions prevalence and demographic factors like age and gender, with a p-value of <0.05. The percentage of oral and maxillofacial lesions in older patients during the period 2002 to 2022 was approximately 7.4%. Regarding gender distribution, 50.9% of the patients were male and 49.1% were female. The average age for females was 68.33 ± 6.449 years, and for males, it was 68.28 ± 7.399 years. Inflammatory lesions were the most common (40.7%) of the cases. Followed by autoimmune diseases (13.9%) while odontogenic cysts, salivary gland disease, and malignant tumors showed the same percentage (9.3%). According to the study's findings on the frequency of oral lesions in geriatrics. Knowledge of clinical signs and histopathology of oral cavity disease is necessary for prevention, early diagnosis, and correct treatment plan.