Patterns of access to public oral health care in Queensland by gender, indigenous status and rurality.

Data were collected on courses of care from all attendances at public sector dental clinics between July 1994 and June 1996 and examined by gender, rurality and indigenous status. Males and indigenous people were more likely to attend dental clinics when a problem with pain existed, resulting in a high need for emergency services, more diagnoses of dental caries, and treatment more often involving oral surgery, including extractions. Similarly, remote area dwellers had more diagnoses of dental caries and oral surgery, although their attendance at clinics was complicated by access.