Abstract

FIGUEROA-MARTIN, Laura; DUARTE-CLIMENTS, Gonzalo; GONZALEZ-PEREZ, Teodoro  and  RUFINO-DELGADO, Trinidad. Towards improving oral health of the elderly: nursing assessment and diagnosis. Ene. [online]. 2014, vol.8, n.3. ISSN 1988-348X.  https://dx.doi.org/10.4321/S1988-348X2014000300006.

Objective: To identify the key questions to assess the oral health of the elderly, the questionnaires available in our environment for this assessment, and related nursing diagnoses. Method: A systematic review of the literature with a search performed with Biblioteca Virtual de Salud, Medline, Cochrane Library, Joanna Briggs Institute, Cuiden, INHATA and BiblioPro. Analysis of contents of Nursing specific assessments and questionnaires available in our environment. Nursing diagnoses related selected through Delphi method. Result: 1949 are finded, 10are selected. In our environment the proposal of the Marjory Gordon's assessment and the valuation of the clinical history used in primary care Canaries, Drago-AP are applied. Among the questionnaires to explore the oral health, OHIP- SP (Oral Impact Profile- Spanish) is showed as the most complete construct. According to experts, there are 29 nursing diagnoses relevant to the oral health of older people, of which 15 show correspondence with items of the questionnaire OHIP- SP after the revision of the defining characteristics. Conclusion: We identified 5 key questions, exploration, questionnaires and 29 diagnoses related, which 14 extend the questionnaire. With these tools it can be designed an action plan directed to the achievement of oral health results on the elderly, and, by that, take care due to improve in this healthy aspect with abroad repercussion about the quality of life and health in general.

Keywords : oral health; aged; dental care for aged; nursing diagnosis; health evaluation.