Awareness and demand of prosthodontic treatment for tooth loss replacement

Tooth loss relates to functional problems and have psychological and social impact. At the end it can cause impairment of Oral Health Related Quality of Life (OHRQoL). Self-awareness is one of the very important factor that influence demand for tooth loss replacement. This study was aimed to analyze relation between self-awareness and demand for prosthodontics treatment and other factors that influence it. A cross sectional study was conducted on 115 adults aged 34 to 80 year using convenience sampling method in Depok, Jawa Barat, Indonesia. Subject was clinically examined for location of tooth loss, posterior contacts (Eichner index) and denture status. Questionnaire used to assess awareness for missing tooth replacement and demand for prosthodontics treatment. Sociodemographic data were also collected. Spearman, Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis test were used to assess the relation between variables. Subject age was between 35-80 years old, and dominated by female (83.5%). Only gender has a significant influence to the awareness of prosthodontics treatment. Awareness and demand for prosthodontic treatment are related (p < 0.05). Increasing the awareness for replacing missing tooth through oral health education could be one preventive procedure to change public perception about their oral and general health.