Periodontal disease is very common and is an important cause of tooth loss. While the impact of other oral conditions on quality of life the impact from periodontal disease has received less attention.  Oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) is a subjective construct that is multidimensional with a number of domains. There is also no universal agreement on its definition.  The aim of this review was to determine whether periodontitis had a negative impact on OHRQoL

The Medline and Embase databases were searched for cross-sectional or prospective observational epidemiological studies. Studies that included information on how periodontal attachment loss was measured; the clinical periodontal parameters measured (i.e. pocket depth and/or clinical attachment loss/level); and how cases of periodontitis were defined were included, if they also used a validated, multi-item OHRQoL instrument.

• Seven papers were included in the review, the majority in developed countries.
• Six of the seven studies reported a negative impact of periodontitis on OHRQoL
• There was a great deal of heterogeneity in the study reporting, diversity of thresholds for periodontal disease and OHRQoL tools used.
• The OHRQoL domains most consistently affected were the physical (functional) and psychological.

The authors concluded

The heterogeneity of methods and reporting in the studies made it difficult to draw definite conclusions on the strength of association between periodontitis and OHRQoL.

The heterogeneity of methods and reporting in the studies made it difficult to draw definite conclusions on the strength of association between periodontitis and OHRQoL.

 

Comment.

While this review searches two databases and has some specific inclusion criteria there is no indication as to whether study selection and data extraction was completed by two independent reviewers. There is also no indication that  there were any language restrictions or whether the quality of the studies was assessed.   These elements should be reported for systematic reviews  which this review does not claim to be. It is however of interest, although as  the authors indicate the quality of the available evidence make it difficult to draw any definitive conclusions.

Links

Al-Harthi, L., Cullinan, M., Leichter, J. and Thomson, W. (2013), The impact of periodontitis on oral health-related quality of life: a review of the evidence from observational studies. Australian Dental Journal. doi: 10.1111/adj.12076