Chilean Patients' Perception of Their Oral Health-Related Quality of Life After Bichectomy

To describe the quality of life associated with oral health in patients who have had bichectomy surgery in Chile using the Spanish version of the health-Related Quality of Life instrument (HRQOL-sp).

We designed a cross-sectional study. The HRQOL-sp scale was administered to dental patients in a private clinic who had bichectomy surgery between December 2020 and June 2021. The HRQOL-sp instrument has four domains: oral function, general activity, postoperative signs, symptoms or complications, and pain level. The instrument was administered by telephone survey on days 1, 3, 5 and 7 post-surgery. Interference in quality of life was defined as when patients selected the options "quite a few problems" or "many problems" for oral function and general activity. Signs and symptoms related to post-surgical complications and pain were also described with a verbal rating scale from one to ten. All results were compared between postoperative days according to the domains of the HRQOL-sp scale.

Seventy-three patients (age 27.75 ± 8.06 years; 93.15% female) participated. Bichectomy patients report the highest interference in quality of life on the first postoperative day because most were unable to chew (71.23%). On the first and third postoperative days, the most frequent complication was swelling (97.26%), and on the fifth day was ecchymosis (42.47%). The average worst perceived pain was 3.34±2.32 on the verbal analogue scale. The rest of the evaluated items significantly decreased towards the seventh postoperative day (p<0.05).

Interference in quality of life associated with bichectomy surgery is greatest on the first postoperative day. Complications and pain levels decreased significantly over time.