Relationship between clinical dental status and eating difficulty in an old Chinese population

This study investigated the relationship between clinical dental status and eating difficulty in a sample of older Chinese people in Guangxi, China. Sample was selected from people aged 55 years and older who had routine annual health check-ups at a large hospital health centre. The sample consisted of 1,196 dentate people who had clinical oral examinations and face-to-face interviews. Different measures, namely the Index of Eating Difficulty, dissatisfaction with chewing ability and ease of eating certain foods were used to measure eating difficulty. Multiple logistic regression analysis showed that after controlling for the effects of age, sex, occupation, self-assessed social class and self-perceived general health, increased eating difficulty was significantly related with having fewer teeth, fewer posterior and anterior occluding pairs of teeth (both natural teeth only and natural plus replaced teeth), more unfilled posterior spaces, more unfilled anterior spaces, mobile teeth, decayed teeth and roots. In conclusion, clinical dental status was strongly related with eating difficulty in a sample of older Chinese dentate people.