Original Research Article
Year: 2017 | Month: September | Volume: 7 | Issue: 9 | Pages: 100-107
Assessment of the Comprehensibility of Oral Health Instructions Given By Health Service Providers to the Outpatients in a Public Hospital at Chennai
Dr. Dipayan Datta1, Dr. S. G. Ramesh Kumar2, Dr. M. B. Aswath Narayanan3, Dr. A. Leena Selvamary2, Dr. A. Sujatha2
1Postgraduate, 2Assistant Professor, 3Professor and Head,
Department of Public Health Dentistry, Tamil Nadu Government Dental College and Hospital, Chennai
Corresponding Author: Dr. Dipayan Datta
ABSTRACT
Introduction: Health literacy is an outcome of health education. The recent trend of high demands of health information has led to an increase in health literacy problems. Dentists often encounter patients with very low oral health literacy resulting in poor health outcomes. Considering the importance of assessing oral health literacy, there is a need for a proper instrument. The objective of the present study is to assess the efficacy of oral hygiene instructions among outpatients in a public hospital at Chennai.
Materials and methods: The cross sectional study was done on randomly selected 100 patients from a public hospital in Chennai. At first they were given all the necessary instructions that are given to a general patient. Then they were given a multiple choice type questionnaire form containing 42 questions under oral hygiene practice, tobacco cessation, diet counselling, prescription & post-treatment instructions. Their performances were graded by the scale: “excellent, good, fair and poor”.
Results: None of them could correct all the questions. Only 4% of the participants scored excellent, 58% scored good, 32% scored fair and 6% scored poor. Participants from high socio-economic status group scored better than the other groups.
Discussion: The participants' comprehension on what they have been instructed is not good enough. To maintain good communication with the oral health care providers their oral health literacy must be improved.
Key words: Oral health literacy, questionnaire, comprehensibility, oral health behaviour