Page 54 - Petelin, Ana. 2024. Ed. Zdravje delovno aktivnih in starejših odraslih | Health of the Working-Age and Older Adults. Zbornik prispevkov z recenzijo | Proceedings. Koper: University of Primorska Press

of adults who reported occasionally or more often avoiding smiling or laugh-
ing (χ test=9.416, p=0.009), avoiding conversation (χ test=8.877, p=0.012) and
2
2
avoiding social activities (χ test=10.773, p=0.01), while there were no statisti-
2
cally significant differences in whether they felt embarrassed about the appear-
ance of their teeth (or dentures).
The survey also analysed differences in OHRQoL by living environment.
The highest proportion of adults from rural areas compared to urban and sub-
urban areas reported occasional or more often limitations in daily life due to
oral and/or dental problems, but only for difficulty eating (urban 17%, subur-
ban 15%, rural 23%), and dental pain (urban 8%, suburban 14%, rural 15%). We
found no differences in the frequency of avoidance of social interactions among
adults by living environment.

Discussion
54 The results of the present survey show that almost one third of the adult popu-
lation in Slovenia occasionally or more often experiences a reduction in qual-
zdravje delovno aktivnih in starejših odraslih | health of working-age and older adults
ity of life due to oral and/or dental problems or avoids social contact because
of these problems. A higher proportion of older people, people with lower lev-
els of education and people from rural areas experience some limitations in
their daily lives due to oral and/or dental problems, indicating inequalities in
OHRQoL according to the socioeconomic status of adults.
In our study, we found no differences in daily life limitations due to oral
and/or dental problems according to gender, which is consistent with the re-
sults of a study conducted in Brazil, which also showed no influence of gender
on oral health-related quality of life (Zucoloto et al., 2016).
In addition to education, age is most strongly associated with differenc-
es in OHRQoL in adults. Our results are consistent with a study conducted in
Brazil on the impact of OHRQoL, which showed that, in addition to pain and
the presence of a chronic disease, age also has an impact on oral health-related
quality of life (Zucoloto et al., 2016). On the other hand, the results of a nation-
al survey in the United States did not show a linear relationship between age
and oral health-related quality of life, but adults aged 50–64 years reported the
worst oral health-related quality of life (Rozier and Pahel, 2008).
Differences in the experience of limitations in daily life due to oral and/or
dental problems according to educational level were also confirmed in a study
of a North American sample: 62% of adults with primary education reported
poor or average oral health-related quality of life, compared with 28% of adults
with at least secondary education (Rozier and Pahel, 2008).
Some of the differences in oral health-related quality of life suggest that
older people and those with less education are more at risk. We believe that it is
worthwhile to increase oral health promotion activities in order to reduce the
differences in the prevalence of oral health-related limitations in daily life in
the Slovenian adult population.