This application is a competing renewal to extend for an additional 12 months a prospective longitudinal cohort study that is investigating oral health and dental care use in a Florida population-based sample. The original study was designed to test over 60 months several hypotheses about the relationship among dental disease measured clinically by dentists, dimensions of oral health reported by subjects participating in the study, and their use of dental services. Building upon knowledge gained from the first four years of the study, the investigators propose to refine and extend their aims to test eight hypotheses that regular dental attendance, problem-oriented dental attendance, and use of specific types of dental care are associated with differences in each self-reported dimension of oral health (disease and tissue damage, pain and discomfort, functional limitation, disadvantage, and self-rated oral health), as well as clinical measures determined by direct clinical examination. The dental care of interest is that provided in private practice, non-academic settings for diverse patient populations. This research will answer key questions about what long-term benefits result from the use of specific dental services. It also will provide an understanding of what benefits, or lack thereof, high-risk groups perceive as being derived from their use of specific dental services, and how this perception, among other factors, affects their use of dental care. This research is the first study to use an innovative approach (directly links clinical exam data, self-reported dimensions of oral health, use of specific dental services, and patient characteristics) to yield new evidence about the effectiveness of dental care, why diverse populations use dental care, and provide important evidence about the role that dental care plays in people's quality of life.
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