Special oral hygiene and preventive care for special needs

Short Description
preventive oral care, and they. may neglect to provide it for. those for whom they are respon-. sible. When providing oral care …

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Content
JADA, Vol. 136 www.ada.org/goto/jada August 2005 1141
Prevention of dental
caries and periodontal
disease for people with
special needs is a challenging
problem in
dentistry. Every dental practice
has patients who have physical
or intellectual disabilities. Additionally,
some patients who
appear to be healthy in other
ways have nearly uncontrollable
dental caries or periodontal
problems that continue to
degenerate without special care.
If these patients receive only
conventional biannual recall
appointments, their conditions
usually continue to become more
severe, with the eventual loss of
teeth. There are numerous effective
preventive programs for
people with special needs, but
these programs and techniques
need to be available in dental
practices, and dentists and
dental hygienists need to inform
patients of that availability.
This article includes an identification
of the types of patients
who have special oral hygiene
needs, as well as a description of
a number of methods to help
them solve or at least reduce
their oral problems.
SITUATIONS REQUIRING
OPTIMUM ORAL
PREVENTIVE PROGRAMS
Patients with intellectual
disabilities. Patients who have
intellectual disabilities may not
understand the need for oral
hygiene or may not be able to
perform it without help from
caregivers. Often, caregivers are…