Use of clinical services compared with patients' perceptions of and satisfaction with oral health status

To examine the relationship between rates of clinical service use and self-reported perception of and satisfaction with oral health status.

Dental services provision rates were calculated using health maintenance organization electronic data for members 55 years of age and older with at least four years of eligibility between 1990 and 2000. A mail survey yielded 986 responses (response rate = 65.7%). Poisson regression was used to examine the relationship between service utilization rates and self-reported perception of and satisfaction with oral health status, controlling for age, education, sex, and marital status.

Perceptions of oral health status and levels of satisfaction with oral health status generally were closely associated. Greater dissatisfaction with oral health status and perception of poorer oral health status were associated with higher usage of nonpreventive dental services. Less satisfaction with oral health status was associated with higher restorative services usage and lower preventive services usage and slightly associated with periodontal service usage. Perception of a less favorable oral health status was strongly associated with higher restorative and periodontal services usage, but had only a weak association with preventive services usage.

Dental plan members' service use is associated with their perception of their oral health status and their level of satisfaction with it. Future work should seek to clarify whether opinions on oral health status and satisfaction are a result of clinical experiences over time or whether the behavior and the values associated with seeking and obtaining care instead shape opinions on status and satisfaction.