Association between oral examination and out-of-pocket expenditures on dental care / 대한구강보건학회지

ABSTRACT

Objectives@#The purpose of this study is to identify the association between oral examinations and out-of-pocket (OOP) expenditures on dental care by age groups. @*Methods@#The Korea Health Panel 2011-2018 data were used to aggregate eight-year outpatient data for 12,684 individuals who were household members that responded to the 2011 survey. The final study subjects included 5,305 individuals who have been retained in the panel with at least one OOP expenditure on dental care over eight years. The dependent and independent variables were the individual’s average OOP dental care expenditures and oral examination, respectively. For age-stratification analysis, they were categorized into seven age groups 18-24, 25-34, 35-44, 45-54, 55-64, 65-74, and 75+years. The difference in OOP expenditures on dental care by subject characteristics was analyzed using t-tests and ANOVA. Log-linear regression models were used to analyze the effect of oral examinations on OOP expenditures on dental care. @*Results@#Individuals who underwent an oral examination had an approximately 1.4% higher OOP expenditure on dental care than their counterparts (β=0.014, P=0.0072). Age-stratified analyses showed that among people in the 55-64 group those who underwent an oral examination had an approximately 2.3% higher OOP expenditure on dental care than non-examiners (β=0.023, P=0.0218). @*Conclusions@#There was no evidence that oral examination could lead to increased OOP expenditure on dental care, except among those aged 55-64.