Assessment and comparison of clinical dental status and its impact on oral health-related quality of life among rural and urban adults of Udaipur, India: A cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND: Dental diseases negatively influence people's oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) and thus their perceived need for dental care. QoL is increasingly acknowledged as a valid, appropriate and significant indicator of service need and intervention outcomes in contemporary public health research and practice. OBJECTIVES: (1) To assess the psychometric properties of oral health impact profile-14 (OHIP-14) scale among rural and urban OHIP of Udaipur population. (2) To assess and compare clinical dental status (dental caries, periodontal disease and prosthetic status) and its impacts on OHRQoL rural and urban population of Udaipur. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A cross-sectional descriptive survey was conducted among rural (600) and urban (600) population of Udaipur that have age ranges between 20 and 79 years, chosen from outpatient department of Pacific Dental College and Hospital. The OHIP-14 was tested for validity and reliability. Chi-square, Student's t-test, analysis of variance and multiple logistic regression analysis were employed for statistical analysis. RESULTS: The Cronbach's alpha of the scale was found to be 0.85 among the rural population and 0.89 among the urban population. Prevalence of periodontal disease (community periodontal index and loss of attachment) was found greater among the rural population than the urban population. Urban population showed significantly greater proportion of subjects with prosthesis (including partial, fixed and total) as compared to the rural population. Among study population, OHIP-14 was significantly (P ≤ 0.05) associated with age, gender, presence of decayed teeth (DT), missing teeth (MT), and location. Significantly greater odds ratio (OR) (OHIP-14) were revealed among males (OR = 1.35, P = 0.02), urban residents (OR = 1.13, P = 0.002), those < 45 years of age (OR = 1.23, P = 0.01), those without DT (OR = 1.48, P = 0.002) and without MT (OR = 1.08, P = 0.03). CONCLUSION: The rural and urban study subjects had a fair clinical status. The presence of dental caries had greatest impacts on OHRQoL. In addition, rural subjects faced greater impact than urban subjects.