Frailty And Oral-Health Related Quality Of Life

Previous studies indicated the associations between oral health and frailty. We aimed to investigate their associations among Chinese community-dwelling older adults in Shanghai. In the cross-sectional study, we enrolled 1122 Chinese community-dwelling older adults for oral examinations and questionnaires in Huangpu District, Shanghai. Oral examinations were conducted according to the World Health Organization's Basic Methods for Oral Health Surveys (5th edition). Frailty was assessed using FRAIL scale and oral-health related quality of life using the Chinese version of Oral Health Impact Profile-14. Among the 1122 participants, 601 were diagnosed with frailty, accounting for 53.57% of the participants. Age, sex, education, BMI, number of teeth lost were significantly different between participants with and without frailty(P<0.05). After adjusting the covariates, logistic regression models showed that OHIP-14 was significantly associated with frailty with OR=1.112 (95% CI 1.086-1.138). A significant model was constructed when tooth loss was used as a mediator of the association between OHIP-14 and frailty. Tooth loss mediated 8.8% of the association between OHIP-14 and frailty (β=0.0102, 95% CI: 0.0066-0.0149). Oral health was significantly associated with frailty and tooth loss had a significant mediating effect on their association. Oral health should be a key focus for both the elderly and healthcare providers, especially tooth loss.