perceived oral health among adults in tehran, iran a telephone survey

objective: in comparison to clinical oral health indices, perceived oral health measures are less applied in large-scale epidemiological oral health studies in iran. the aim of this study was to measure perceived oral health among adults in tehran, iran. methods: in this cross-sectional study, perceived oral health was measured in 1100 adults in tehran by two measures: 1- non-replaced extracted teeth, and 2- revised rand dental health questions including pain, chewing problems and communication problems. data was gathered by telephone interview using gender, age and level of education as socio-demographic information. results: the mean number of non-replaced extracted teeth was 1.28 with 53.8% of adults reporting no extracted teeth. extracted teeth was significantly less in younger (p<0.001) and more educated people (p<0.001). rand dental health scores increased by age (p<0.001) but had no significant changes in different educational levels. the three items of rand dental health were highly correlated (p <0.01) with chronbach’s alpha=0.73 but were not correlated with extracted teeth. conclusion: approximately half of tehran adults have the experience of lacking one or more teeth, with a small group of them suffering from pain, chewing problems and communication problems.