Journal ArticleDOI
From victim blaming to upstream action: tackling the social determinants of oral health inequalities
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TLDR
A conceptual shift is needed away from this biomedical/behavioural 'downstream' approach, to one addressing the 'upstream' underlying social determinants of population oral health.Abstract:
The persistent and universal nature of oral health inequalities presents a significant challenge to oral health policy makers. Inequalities in oral health mirror those in general health. The universal social gradient in both general and oral health highlights the underlying influence of psychosocial, economic, environmental and political determinants. The dominant preventive approach in dentistry, i.e. narrowly focusing on changing the behaviours of high-risk individuals, has failed to effectively reduce oral health inequalities, and may indeed have increased the oral health equity gap. A conceptual shift is needed away from this biomedical/behavioural 'downstream' approach, to one addressing the 'upstream' underlying social determinants of population oral health. Failure to change our preventive approach is a dereliction of ethical and scientific integrity. A range of complementary public health actions may be implemented at local, national and international levels to promote sustainable oral health improvements and reduce inequalities. The aim of this article is to stimulate discussion and debate on the future development of oral health improvement strategies.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
Dentistry's social contract is at risk.
Jamie Moeller,Carlos Quiñonez +1 more
TL;DR: The authors examine the failure of the dental profession to adequately address population needs and inequities in oral health, situating this in the context of an increasingly commodified, commercialized, cosmetically oriented, and proprietary culture in the profession.
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Factors associated with self-reported number of teeth in a large national cohort of Thai adults
TL;DR: This study addresses the gap in knowledge on factors associated with self-reported number of teeth among Thai adults and suggests public health interventions to increase tooth retention in middle and older age are important.
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The impact of education on dental health - Ways to measure causal effects.
TL;DR: This commentary provides an overview of the state of the art of the following methods: the use of instrumental variables, twin studies and a regression discontinuity design, which are relevant to use for estimating a possible causal effect of education on dental health.
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A cross-sectional survey to assess the effect of socioeconomic status on the oral hygiene habits.
TL;DR: The oral hygiene practices of the patients from upper and lower middle class was found to be satisfactory whereas it was poor among patients belonging to lower and upper lower class.
Journal ArticleDOI
Intergenerational and Social Interventions to Improve Children's Oral Health.
Mary E. Northridge,Mary E. Northridge,Eric W. Schrimshaw,Ivette Estrada,Ariel Port Greenblatt,Sara S. Metcalf,Carol Kunzel +6 more
TL;DR: There is currently limited evidence on which community-based, population-level interventions are most effective and equitable in promoting children's oral health, and more rigorous measurement and reporting of study findings are needed to improve the quality of available evidence.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
Social determinants of health inequalities
TL;DR: A Commission on Social Determinants of Health is launching, which will review the evidence, raise societal debate, and recommend policies with the goal of improving health of the world's most vulnerable people.
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Health inequalities among British civil servants: the Whitehall II study
Michael Marmot,Stephen Stansfeld,Chandrakant R. Patel,Fiona M North,Jenny Head,Ian R. White,Eric J. Brunner,A Feeney,G. Davey Smith +8 more
TL;DR: There was an inverse association between employment grade and prevalence of angina, electrocardiogram evidence of ischaemia, and symptoms of chronic bronchitis, and self-perceived health status and symptoms were worse in subjects in lower status jobs.
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The World Oral Health Report 2003: continuous improvement of oral health in the 21st century – the approach of the WHO Global Oral Health Programme
TL;DR: The current oral health situation and development trends at global level are described and WHO strategies and approaches for better oral health in the 21st century are outlined.
Journal ArticleDOI
Socioeconomic status and health: what we know and what we don't.
Nancy E. Adler,Joan M. Ostrove +1 more
TL;DR: This paper examines the data regarding the SES‐health gradient, addressing causal direction, generalizability across populations and diseases, and associations with health for different indicators of SES.
Journal ArticleDOI
Predicting and Explaining Intentions and Behavior: How Well Are We Doing?
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors evaluate the performance of these models in predicting and explaining intentions and behavior, and discuss the distinction between prediction and explanation, the different standards of comparison against which predictive performance can be judged, and the use of percentage of variance explained as a measure of effect size.
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