Social disparity and oral health

Abstract

There is a clear reported association between social disparity and oral health, for example, between dental caries and malnutrition in children. This fact is detected in several studies, and also found amongst the Brazilian population. However, several efforts have been made to improve the quality of life of the population and to achieve the 2015 Millennium Development Goals. Oral health is a branch to be improved among these goals. The Brazilian experience has been drawing the attention of authorities, insofar as there have been direct improvements in oral health through state oral health programs, and also indirect results by improving the quality of life of the population. Included within the Brazilian oral health programs are the Family Health Program and Smiling Brazil Program. The former is a global healthcare program which involves primary oral healthcare, while the latter is a specialized oral care program. Among the social programs that would indirectly improve oral health are Family Stipend and the Edmond and Lily Safra International Institute of Neuroscience of Natal (ELS-IINN). In conclusion, although oral health problems are related to socioeconomic factors, the implementation of primary oral health programs and programs to improve the population's quality of life may directly or indirectly improve the oral health scenario. This fact is being observed in Brazil, where the oral health policies have changed, and social programs have been implemented.

Socioeconomic inequalities in dental health services in Sao Paulo, Brazil, 2003–2008

“…It aims to improve access to dental care at all levels of complexity, including preventive oral health services, basic oral health services and complex rehabilitation oral health services [3, 5]. Additionally, it aims to increase the quality of care for all dental health problems and decrease inequalities in dental services use [3, 5, 6]. Smiling Brazil promoted an increase in dental health care teams, which usually consists of a dentist, an oral health technician and an oral health assistant [4].…”

“…Manfredini et al [2] found that São Paulo offered poor access to public dental care during the period 2000 to 2009, with reduced supply of services to adults and older people. Cost is another important barrier to using dental health services [6, 14] especially for low-income groups [14, 15]. In addition, most private practices are also incompatible with the needs of low-income communities [15].…”

“…In addition, most private practices are also incompatible with the needs of low-income communities [15]. The Smiling Brazil program provides free dental care and aims to remove this barrier [5, 6]. However, although we know the policy achieved an increase in access to dental care services, it is still unclear who benefited most from this increased access and whether the national oral health policy actually succeeded in decreasing socioeconomic inequalities in the use of these health care services.…”

Factors that influence the oral impact on daily performance of older people in Brazil: A cross‐sectional population‐based study

“…Although the state of São Paulo is considered one of the richest and more developed regions in Brazil, it also has a big and unequal population representative of the nation. OIDP variation between 2010 and 2015 could have been due to the effectiveness of the Brazilian public policy on oral health (Smiling Brazil Program), which was associated with an improvement in oral health services, increasing use of public dental services and decrease in poverty …”

“…This is of relevance because policymakers should consider other factors than opening new dental services, expanding access and increasing the number of dental procedures. These actions are of relevance for improving the population's oral health; however, they should be accompanied by programmes to reduce poverty, increase life expectancy and improve daily life conditions for improvement of general health quality of life …”