Assessment of Oral Health Seeking Behaviour and Utilization Among WHOIndexedAge Groups of a Union Territory in India: A Cross-sectional Survey

Oral health has long been recognized as a vital component of overall health. With the increasing life expectancy of the Indian population, maintaining good oral health is essential for enhancing an individual’s quality of life. While there is an awareness of the importance of oral health as part of overall wellness, access to dental services often reveals a different narrative. Barriers such as unawareness or ignorance of oral health conditions, along with socioeconomic status (SES), can impede individuals from obtaining necessary care. Objectives: To find out the Oral Health Seeking Behaviour and Dental service utilization among WHO-Indexed Age Groups of a union territory in India. Material and Methods A cross-sectional study was done in GGH Yanam among WHO-indexed age groups using a pretested and validated questionnaire in February 2024. A convenience sampling technique resulted in a sample size of 324 to assess this population's oral health-care-seeking behavior and perception. The obtained data were analyzed using SPSS version 26. Descriptive statistics and the Chi-square test were used to summarize the results, where ≤ 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results 59.9% of study participants are males. Around 80.2% of the study participants utilized dental services. Oral health service utilization among the 12-year age group was 1.789 times more when compared to the 65-74-year age group, which was statistically significant (P < 0.001). Conclusion The importance of oral health education to improve poor perceptions of oral health and to encourage people to seek preventive care instead of accessing care at the terminal end of illness due to pain cannot be overemphasized. Therefore, there is a need to integrate oral health education and awareness in hospitals. Key Words: Dental services, Oral health care, Perception, Seeking behaviour, Utilization