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Updated: Sep 22, 2025
Oral Health Assessment by Lay Personnel for Older Adults
Published on: February 2, 2020
The Association between Number of Teeth and Cognitive Frailty in Older Adults: A Cross-Sectional Study
1Xinjuan Wu and Wei Chen, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences - Peking Union Medical College, Peking Union Medical College Hospital (Dongdan campus), Beijing, 100730, China, Xinjuan Wu: wuxinjuan@sina.com; Wei Chen: txchenwei@sina.com.
Objectives:
This study aimed to explore the association between number of teeth and cognitive frailty in American older adults.
Design:
Cross-sectional study.
Setting:
Community.
Participants:
The participants were 1,531 community-dwelling older adults aged 60 or older from the NHANES database.
Methods:
Frailty was assessed using a 49-item frailty index, with a cut-off value for frailty of more than 0.21. Cognitive dysfunction was evaluated by the Digit-Symbol Coding Test (DSCT), with the cut-off being below the lowest interquartile range (scores ≤37). Cognitive frailty was defined as participants who suffered from both frailty and cognitive dysfunction. Oral health indicators included number of teeth and other factors, such as the presence of gum disease, daily use of dental floss, daily use of mouthwash and self-rated oral health. Multivariable logistic regression models were used to explore the relationship between number of teeth and cognitive frailty.
Results:
The mean age of the total sample was 69.67 (SD=6.60) years, and 52.71% (n=807) were female. Our study suggests there was a negative association between number of teeth and cognitive frailty (OR =0.98,95%CI:0.96-0.99, P=0.044) after controlling for potential confounding factors. In addition, older adults with 20 or more teeth had lower odds of being cognitively frail (OR=0.66,95%CI:0.44-0.99, P=0.046) than individuals who had less than 20 teeth.
Conclusion:
This study suggests that older adults who have more teeth are associated with a lower risk of cognitive frailty. This finding highlights the importance of maintaining as many teeth as possible throughout life and into old age. Cohort studies will be required in the future to determine this relationship.
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