The effects of oral health education on long-term variations in periodontal status of diabetics

Purpose: The aim of this study was to evaluate the long-term effects of oral health education program on periodontal status of patients with diabetes mellitus (DM). Materials and methods: A one-year longitudinal cohort method was implemented and long-term evaluations of periodontal status of DM patients were conducted in a medical center in Taiwan from Jan 2008 to Dec 2008. Variations in oral health behaviors and habits were used to assess the long-term effects of oral health education on periodontal status by Community Periodontal Index (CPI). Results: In total, 95 qualified DM patients were enrolled in this study. Among them, 70.5% presented with periodontitis in the initial epoch compared with only 20.0% in the final epoch. Significant changes in periodontal status (p<0.01) revealed the long-term effects of implementation of oral health behaviors and habits gleaned from oral health educational courses. Major determinants of the long-term variations in periodontal status were changes in cigarette smoking and dental floss use on generalized estimating equation (GEE) modeling. Conclusions: Our results revealed that oral health education can reduce incidence of periodontitis in DM patients. Further large-scale research is needed to confirm our findings.