A new brief measure of oral quality of life.
BACKGROUND
We developed a brief measure of the impact of oral conditions on individual functioning and well-being, known as oral quality of life.


METHODS
Among older male veterans (N = 827) and community dental patients (N = 113), we administered surveys consisting of extant oral quality of life items, using clinical dental data from the veteran samples. We assigned each oral quality of life item to a theoretical dimension, conducted an iterative series of multitrait scaling analyses to examine the item-fit with the dimensions, reduced the number of items, and examined the psychometric characteristics of new scales and their association with clinical indices.


RESULTS
We developed two brief oral quality of life scales, one consisting of 12 items and the other of 6, the latter a subset of the former. Each demonstrated sound psychometric properties and was sensitive to clinical indices.


CONCLUSIONS
The two brief oral quality of life scales can be used to assess the population-based impact of oral conditions as well as outcomes of dental care.
Kressin
Nancy R
NR
Center for Health Quality, Outcomes and Economic Research, 200 Springs Road, Building 70 (152), Bedford, MA 01730, USA. nkressin@bu.edu
Jones
Judith A
JA
Orner
Michelle B
MB
Spiro
Avron
A
D005260:Female; D006305:Health Status Indicators; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009059:Mouth Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000473:pathology*; D009909:Oral Health / Q000592:standards; D011594:Psychometrics; D011788:Quality of Life; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology