DT News - UK - Nurses and midwives could improve the oral health of mothers and children

Dental Tribune International

Tue. 6 December 2016

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LONDON, UK: During pregnancy, women are at a higher risk for dental disease owing to hormonal changes. Moreover, it has been found that maternal oral health status and oral hygiene practices significantly influence both their children’s general and oral health. Nevertheless, many pregnant women, as well as young mothers and their children, do not visit the dentist regularly. According to a new study, involving nurses and midwives in basic oral healthcare services could be a promising option to improve the oral health of expectant women and young children.

Owing to financial barriers, the shortage of dental personnel or the unavailability of dental care in certain areas as well as the existing separation between the medical and dental professions, many young mothers and their children do not receive the professional dental care they need, the UK researchers stated in their study. The resulting oral health disparities are a major issue, especially among deprived communities. Moreover, the researchers pointed out that oral health is usually a much-neglected aspect of prenatal and perinatal care, both among caregivers and patients.

Therefore, the UK scientists aimed to determine whether integrating oral health promotion in nursing and midwifery practice might be beneficial to the oral health of expectant women and young children. According to the researchers, nurses and midwives in particular, are potentially in an excellent position to assist in basic oral health services, such as dental health education and intraoral screening.

The researchers conducted a systematic review, including 21 studies on oral health interventions incorporated into standard nursing practices. They reviewed randomised and non-randomised trials and observational studies on preventive oral health programmes delivered by nurses or midwives in healthcare settings or during home visits.

According to the review, 18 programmes reported significant positive outcomes, including the reduction of caries, better oral hygiene and dietary habits and increased rates of dental visits among young children, as reported by their caregivers. Moreover, the researchers found moderate evidence that maternal oral health also improved through the oral health interventions of nurses and midwives—although many programmes solely focused on the oral health of the children.

The study suggests that maternity and paediatric nurses and midwives could routinely provide expectant mothers with oral health counselling before and after childbirth. They could also play a pivotal role in identifying at-risk mothers or children by performing oral screenings and risk assessments resulting in subsequent referrals to dentists for dental treatment, the researchers said. Therefore, they recommend the incorporation of basic knowledge and guidelines on oral disease prevention into the existing undergraduate and postgraduate curricula of non-dental healthcare professionals.

“Integrating oral care interventions into nursing practice can be feasibly implemented to serve different community groups across a multitude of locations, ranging from primary care and maternal child health centres, hospital-based clinics to home settings,” the researchers stated in their findings. They therefore believe that nurses and midwives could contribute to the reduction of oral health disparities within disadvantaged populations and could expand the access that young mothers and their children have to preventive dental care.

The study, titled “Integrating Maternal and Children’s Oral Health Promotion into Nursing and Midwifery Practice—A Systematic Review”, was conducted by researchers at Imperial College of London. It was published online on 23 November in the PLOS ONE journal.

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