Survey report on oral health knowledge among 35-44-year-old individuals in Guangdong Province (2015-2016) / 口腔疾病防治

ABSTRACT

Objective@#To understand the level and current status of oral health knowledge among people aged 35-44 years in Guangdong Province and to provide a reference for oral health education in Guangdong Province.@*Methods@#An equal-sized, stratified, multistage, random sampling design was applied to obtain representative sample groups consisting of 288 Guangdong residents aged 35-44 years in four urban areas and four rural areas with a gender ratio of one to one. According to the Guideline of the 4th National Oral Health Survey, a questionnaire survey was conducted, and a statistical analysis of the questionnaire responses related to oral health knowledge was performed.@*Results@#In total, 288 people participated in the survey, of which 95.8 percent were aware that “Oral health is very important to their own lives, and the prevention of oral diseases depends on themselves first”, 76.0% recognized that “Regular oral examination is very necessary”, and 66.7% disagreed that “Teeth were innate and had little to do with their own protection”. The percentages of participants that agreed with the statements “Eating sugar can cause dental caries”, “Oral disease may affect general health”, “Bacteria may cause dental caries” and “Bacteria may cause gum inflammation” were 87.2%, 84.7%, 80.9%, and 80.2%, respectively. However, the rates of awareness that teeth could be protected by fluoride and by pit and fissure sealant were only 36.8% and 18.8%, respectively.@*Conclusion@#General knowledge of oral health care was relatively high among adults aged 35-44 years in Guangdong Province, but knowledge of fluoride, pit and fissure sealing and caries prevention was relatively low. Oral health education should be continuously improved, especially regarding the popularization of oral health knowledge.