Relationship between implantation of missing anterior teeth and oral health-related quality of life.

PURPOSE: The aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship between anterior teeth implantation and oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL).
METHODS: Participants completed the Chinese version of the Oral Health Impact Profile-14 (OHIP-14) prior to implantation and at 6 months following crown restoration. Participant demographic information was recorded. Six months following implant crown restoration, participants were asked to self-assess their overall oral health and implant restoration. A Kruskal-Wallis test and Spearman correlation test were used for statistical analyses. A p value <0.05 was considered statistically significant.
RESULTS: A total of 238 patients (133 women and 105 men) completed the study. OHP-14 scores were negatively correlated with self-assessment of both overall oral health (r = -0.788, p < 0.001) and implant restoration (r = -0.739, p < 0.001) after implant crown restoration. There were no significant differences between qualitative reasons for dissatisfaction or between quantity of reasons given for dissatisfaction (p = 0.845). Six months following crown restoration, the overall OHIP-14 scores and the four common factors (disability, psychological discomfort, functional limitation, pain, and discomfort) decreased significantly compared to preimplantation scores (p < 0.001). From the paired differences between genders before and after implantation, significant differences were observed in overall quality (p = 0.044) and disability (p = 0.029). Patients with a higher education level scored significantly higher on overall quality of life (p = 0.031) and psychological discomfort (p = 0.002) following crown restoration.
CONCLUSIONS: Our findings indicate that the implantation of anterior missing teeth could significantly improve patient OHRQoL. Gender and education level were shown to affect implantation results.