Title
Oral health determinants of incident malnutrition in community-dwelling older adults
Author
Kiesswetter, E.
Hengeveld, L.M.
Keijser, B.J.
Volkert, D.
Visser, M.
Publication year
2019
Abstract
Objective: Poor oral health might be a modifiable determinant of malnutrition in older age. We aimed to investigate the associations of multiple oral health characteristics with incident malnutrition in community-dwelling older adults. Methods: This exploratory analysis is based on prospective data from 893 participants, aged 55–80 years without malnutrition in 2005/06 from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam. In 2007, 19 oral health characteristics from the domains teeth/dentures, oral hygiene, oral problems, and self-rated oral health were assessed by questionnaire. Incident malnutrition was defined as presence of low body mass index (<20 kg/m² in people <70 years, <22 kg/m² ?70 years) and/or self-reported involuntary weight loss ?5% in previous 6 months at any of the follow-ups (2008/09, 2012/13, 2015/16). Associations of oral aspects with incident malnutrition were analyzed by cox proportional hazard models and adjusted for confounders. Results: The 9-year incidence of malnutrition was 13.5%. Sixteen of 19 oral health aspects were not associated with incident malnutrition in the crude models. Adjusted hazard ratios for incident malnutrition were 2.14 (1.10–4.19, p = 0.026) for toothache while chewing, 2.10 (0.88–4.98, p = 0.094) for an unhealthy oral health status, and 1.99 (0.93–4.28, p = 0.077) for xerostomia in edentulous participants, however, the two latter ones failing to reach statistical significance. Conclusions: We identified toothache while chewing as determinant of incident malnutrition in community-dwelling older adults, and found indications that poor oral health and xerostomia in combination with having no teeth may play a role in developing malnutrition. However, these outlined tendencies need to be proven in further studies. Clinical Significance: Regarding the development of strategies to prevent malnutrition in older people toothache while chewing, xerostomia, and self-rated oral health would be of specific interest as these factors are modifiable and can be easily assessed by self-reports. © 2019 Elsevier Ltd
Subject
Aged
Community
Dentures
Nutritional status
Tooth
Xerostomia
Oral
Health
Adults
Malnutrition
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http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:c4f403c6-4f19-4b60-88c9-8eae81f58264
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdent.2019.05.017
TNO identifier
867354
ISSN
3005-712
Source
Journal of Dentistry, 85, 73-80
Document type
article