Research on Oral Health Detailed by Researchers at University of Washington (Health insurance is associated with dental care use among university students in Washington State): Health and Medicine – Oral Health

2023 FEB 02 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Investigators publish new report on oral health. According to news originating from the University of Washington by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “The goal of this study was to examine the association of health insurance and preventive dental care use among university students.”

The news reporters obtained a quote from the research from University of Washington: “This secondary analysis of cross-sectional data focused on students at University of Washington in Washington state (WA) who completed a health insurance survey in 2017 (n = 3768). The exposure was health insurance (private insurance in WA [reference group], not insured, Medicaid or Medicare [public insurance], university insurance, private insurance not in WA, other) and the outcome was receiving a dental cleaning in the past 6 months. Logistic regression was used to generate odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals (CI) adjusted for confounders. About 5% of university students did not have health insurance and 37% did not have a dental cleaning in the past 6 months. Compared to students with private health insurance based in WA, the odds of not receiving a dental cleaning were 3.90 times greater for university students with no health insurance (95% CI 2.74, 5.55; p < .001) and 3.08 times greater for publicly-insured university students (95% CI 2.52, 3.76; p < .001).”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “University students are at risk for poor oral health behaviors. Those without health insurance and those with public insurance face barriers to preventive dental care. Efforts should be made to connect uninsured university students with insurance, dental services, and other oral health promotion activities.”

For more information on this research see: Health insurance is associated with dental care use among university students in Washington State. BMC Oral Health, 2023,23(1):1-9. (BMC Oral Health - http://bmcoralhealth.biomedcentral.com). The publisher for BMC Oral Health is BMC.

A free version of this journal article is available at https://doi.org/10.1186/s12903-023-02724-6.

Our news journalists report that more information may be obtained by contacting Courtney M. Hill, Department of Oral Health Sciences, University of Washington. Additional authors for this research include Darragh Kerr, Donald L. Chi.

(Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.)