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 Table of Contents  
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Year : 2020  |  Volume : 18  |  Issue : 1  |  Page : 66-69

Estimation of oral health approaches among industrial employees of Bhopal City, India


1 Department of Public Health Dentistry, People's Dental Academy, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India
2 Department of Public Health Dentistry, SMBT Dental College and Hospital, Ahmednagar, Maharashtra, India
3 Department of Public Health Dentistry, UCMS College of Dental Surgery, Bhairahawa, Nepal
4 Department of Public Health Dentistry, People's College of Dental Science, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India

Date of Submission23-Jan-2018
Date of Decision10-Jan-2020
Date of Acceptance23-Jan-2020
Date of Web Publication2-Mar-2020

Correspondence Address:
Dr. Anshika Khare
Department of Public Health Dentistry, People's Dental Academy, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh
India
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Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None


DOI: 10.4103/jiaphd.jiaphd_26_18

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  Abstract 


Background: Urbanization shows the way of the development of plentiful industries in a large and small scale and provides the main source of employment worldwide. Apart from providing employment, industrialization also improves the standard of living but makes the life hectic. Thus, time is a constraint for employees to implement healthy performances and overlook their oral health. Aim: This study aims to estimate oral health approaches among industrial employees of Bhopal city. Materials and Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study conducted among 448 industrial employees of the General Engineering Industry from 4th to 10th December 2016 to estimate oral health approaches in the form of their comprehensive awareness, stance, and practices. The data collection was done with a predesigned close-ended and pretested questionnaire encompassed with 16 questions. Statistical analysis was done using the Statistical Package of Social Science (SPSS Version 20; Chicago Inc., Chicago, Illinois, USA). Chi-square test was used for statistical analysis. Results: The results of this study showed that 48.7% of employees said, oral health is good for general health (P = 0.001). About 90.6% of employees used a toothbrush for cleaning their teeth (P = 0.37), 74.1% brushed once a day (P = 0.001), 36.6% changed their brushes in every 4–6 months (P = 0.001). Conclusion: This study concluded industrial employees had adequate knowledge about their oral health. Oral hygiene practices to acclimatize toothbrush and toothpaste are quite satisfactory. Nevertheless, attitude regarding oral health is not very good; might because of the difference in socioeconomic status.

Keywords: Attitude, knowledge, oral health and practices


How to cite this article:
Khare A, Saxena V, Jain M, Sharva V, Dayma A, Kushwah PS. Estimation of oral health approaches among industrial employees of Bhopal City, India. J Indian Assoc Public Health Dent 2020;18:66-9

How to cite this URL:
Khare A, Saxena V, Jain M, Sharva V, Dayma A, Kushwah PS. Estimation of oral health approaches among industrial employees of Bhopal City, India. J Indian Assoc Public Health Dent [serial online] 2020 [cited 2024 Mar 29];18:66-9. Available from: https://journals.lww.com/aphd/pages/default.aspx/text.asp?2020/18/1/66/279816




  Introduction Top


Urbanization shows the way of the development of plentiful industries in large and small scale and provides the main source of employment worldwide. Apart from providing employment, industrialization also improves the standard of living but increases the hectic lifestyle. The agenda to work in industries are very intricate because of their long working hours and night shifts. Industrial employees are time-bound workers and always struggle in an awful hassle environment. Therefore, time is a constraint for employees to implement healthy performances, overlook their oral health.

As occupational stress enhance the adoption of nonhealthy behavior, such as worsening of tooth brushing, neglecting oral hygiene maintenance, and adopting adverse habits such as smoking, chewing, and drinking[1],[2],[3] their evidential proof also available in the literature that job stress is a risk indicator for adverse oral health outcomes.[4],[5],[6],[7],[8]

We all know that oral health plays a decisive role in our general health. Therefore, it is indispensable to enhance awareness regarding the oral health of industrial employees that ultimately helps to develop an immense stance to adopt high-quality oral hygiene practices. As General Engineering Industry (GEI) is one of the renowned industries of Bhopal City that makes air-cooled heat exchangers, air-cooled steam condensers. Manufacturing of heat exchangers is mainly associated with the welding of complex metal parts that involves extreme heat and welding fumes and gases production. These gases and fumes are composed of various chemicals which exceptionally treacherous for overall health as well as oral health. Therefore, the unique feature to design this study is a pioneer attempt on the estimation of their oral health approaches of industrial employees that will able to provide their desires, which ultimately helpful to elevate their oral health profile.


  Materials and Methods Top


A cross-sectional study was conducted among 448 GEI industrial employees of Bhopal city from 4th to 10th December 2016 and the study population chosen according to the census enumeration of industrial employees. A total of 472 employees were working in the industry, but the study population comprised of only permanent industrial employees working for the past 3 years and those who were willing to participate. Thus, after setting the criteria, a total of 448 employees participated in the study. The ethical clearance obtained from the Ethical Committee of People's Dental Academy, Bhopal. A pilot study was conducted among 30 industrial employees to ensure the desired achievability with a predesigned questionnaire. Kuppuswamy[9] scale was used to assess socioeconomic status.

The data collection was done with self-designed and pretested questionnaire comprised of 16 questions. The questionnaire was close-ended, and no subdomain was present. The reliability and validity of the questionnaire checked with kappa statistics (k = 0.8). All the questions explained to subjects by the interviewer and a recording clerk was present to fill all the questionnaires. In this study, industrial employees ranging in strata of upper-middle, lower-middle, and upper-lower class of socioeconomic status. Statistical analysis was done by the statistical package of social science (SPSS version 20 Chicago Inc., Chicago, Illinois, USA). The Chi-square test used to evaluate the level of comprehensive awareness, stance, and practice of industrial employees. The P < 0.05 was considered as statistically significant.


  Results Top


Comprehensive oral health awareness of industrial employees according to their socioeconomic status showed that out of 448 employees, 218 (48.7%) stated that oral health is good for general health and 192 (42.9%) noticed dental decay by pain initiation. Statistically significant difference was present in (question 1 and 4) comprehensive awareness of industrial employees [Table 1].
Table 1: Oral health comprehensive awareness of industrial employees according to the socioeconomic status

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The oral health attitude of industrial employees according to their socioeconomic status showed that out of 448 employees, 194 (43.3%) said their oral health status is good. About 65.6% of employees told, they never visited a dentist, whereas 70 (15.6%) told they visited a dentist twice in the last year, and dental pain was the most common complaint. Of 448, 266 (59.4%) employees stated they prefer extraction as a treatment of dental decay [Table 2].
Table 2: Oral health stance of industrial employees according their socioeconomic status

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Oral hygiene practice of industrial employees according to their socioeconomic status showed that 404 (90.6%) employees used toothbrush and 442 (98.7%) used toothpaste for cleaning their teeth. Three hundred and thirty-two (74.1%) employees brushed once a day, 164 (36.6%) changed their brushes in every 4–6 months, 182 (40.6%) used toothpick/stick for cleaning their teeth. There was no statistically significant difference present regarding oral hygiene practice of Q1, 23, Q6 (P > 0.05), whereas a highly statistically significant difference was present regarding oral hygiene practice for Q3, Q4, and Q5 [Table 3].
Table 3: Oral health practices of industrial employees according to socioeconomic status

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  Discussion Top


A descriptive cross-sectional study conducted among 448 GEI industrial employees of Bhopal city to estimate their oral health approaches according to their socioeconomic status, in a form of comprehensive awareness, stance, and practices.

The present study of GEI, industrial employees, illustrates that 95.1% of employees were satisfactorily aware regarding the causation of dental caries and oral cancer. Employees have also had a superior acquaintance on the subject of availability of dental facility in their premises in the form of government or private clinic.

The current study reveals that 43.3% of employees had an excellent stance concerning their mouth condition, 13.4% said that their mouth state is bad. Approximately comparable result found with the study accomplished by Kumar et al.[10] In this study, only 7.3% perceived the appearance of their teeth and gums to be poor. While the present study conflict with the study carried out by Petersen and Henmar,[11] they found oral health behavior and attitudes of adults in Lithuania, showed that, among all the dentate persons, and 45% of the adults claimed to have poor teeth.

The present study elucidates that 65.6% never visited the dentist, only 34.4% visited the dentist, and 17.9% showed that dental pain was the most common reason for their dental visit, and extraction was the preferred choice of treatment in 59.4% of employees. This might be because; industrial employees are time-bound workers and due to their protracted functioning hours; whereas a study conducted by Kumar et al.,[10] 34.3% never visited a dentist. 48.3% visited a dentist only when there is pain/discomfort. 7.4% stated that they make a periodic visit once in 6 months. Ten percent stated that they make once a year.

The current study given the thought that more than 90% of employees use toothbrush and toothpaste and 2.7% uses a finger, 0.4% used tree stick for oral hygiene maintenance.

Nearly analogs result found with the study accomplished by Bansal and Veeresha[12] in this nearly 90.9% (1258) used toothbrush, 3.1% (43) tree stick, 0.5% (7) finger, and 5.5% (76) used more than one aid for brushing. 91.3% (1263) used toothpaste.

In this study, 74.1% of employees brush their teeth once, and 24.1% brush their teeth twice. A study conducted by Bansal M et al.,[12] 82.3% workers brush their teeth once a day, 17.1% (237) brushed their teeth twice daily, and only 0.6% (8) brushed occasionally. Whereas, a study conducted by Patil et al.[13] showed that it found that 18.9% of the workers used their fingers for cleaning their teeth and 81.1% cleaned their teeth with a toothbrush.

In this study, 36.6% of employees had changed their brush every 4–6 months, 35.3% change their toothbrush in 1 or more than 1 year. About 40.6% of employees had used a toothpick to clean their teeth, 15.6% used mouthwash as other oral hygiene aids, while 35.7% not used any other oral hygiene aid.


  Conclusion Top


The present study shows quite a lot of industrial employees had adequate knowledge about their oral health and their oral hygiene practices. To acclimatize toothbrush and toothpaste, as oral hygiene practices are also quite satisfactory. However, attitude regarding oral health is not very good; might be because a number of employees were upper-lower class of socioeconomic status; therefore, they have constrained affordable capacity for dental care that is why they are not incredibly concerned about their oral health to obtain other oral hygiene aids such as mouth wash, dental floss, and interdental brushes.

Recommendations

This study gave a suggestion about the oral health approaches of industrial employees and emphasized the need for various primary oral health-care programs such as standard dental screening camps and education about ill-effects of oral habits. This will be very helpful in fulfilling the deep-seated oral health demands of industrial employees. This study also provides the baseline data for further exploration and strategic planning and formulation to deliver a better quality of oral health care at the primary level.

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to thank the CEO of GEI, industry his authorization, also to the HR manager for their enormous support and last but not least, all employees who contributed in the study.

Financial support and sponsorship

Nil.

Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts of interest.



 
  References Top

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Genco RJ, Ho AW, Grossi SG, Dunford RG, Tedesco LA. Relationship of stress, distress and inadequate coping behaviors to periodontal disease. J Periodontol 1999;70:711-23.  Back to cited text no. 7
    
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Stansfeld S, Head J, Marmot M. Work Related Factors and Ill Health. The Whitehall II Study. Norwich: Health and Safety Executive; 2000.  Back to cited text no. 8
    
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Kumar BP, Dudala SR, Rao AR. Kuppuswamy's socio-economic status scale- a revision of economic parameter for 2012. Int J Res Dev Health 2013;1:2-4.  Back to cited text no. 9
    
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Kumar MR, Chaly PE, Reddy VC, Ingle NA. Oral Health knowledge, attitude, practices and oral hygiene status of factory workers. J Indian Assoc Public Health Dent 2011;9:541-8.  Back to cited text no. 10
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Petersen PE, Henmar P. Oral conditions among workers in the Danish granite industry. Scand J Work Environ Health 1988;14:328-31.  Back to cited text no. 11
    
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Bansal M, Veeresha KL. Oral health status and treatment needs among factory employees in Baddi-Barotiwala-Nalagarh industrial hub, Himachal Pradesh, India. Indian J Oral Sci 2013;4:105-9.  Back to cited text no. 12
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Patil VV, Shigli K, Hebbal M, Agrawal N. Tooth loss, prosthetic status and treatment needs among industrial workers in Belgaum, Karnataka, India. J Oral Sci 2012;54:285-92.  Back to cited text no. 13
    



 
 
    Tables

  [Table 1], [Table 2], [Table 3]



 

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