Oral malodor is a problem that traverses history, culture, race and sex. But, up to the present the study on prevalence of oral malodor in normal population is short, especially there is no study on oral malodor prevalence in Korean.
In our study, we investigated self-evaluation of oral malodor, self-rating intensity of oral malodor, patients efforts for curing their oral malodor, and degree of satisfaction with their efforts. Investigation was carried out on 368 public Koreans resident in a big city(174 males, 194 females), by method of self-reporting to prepared questionnaire.
There was no difference in self-reporting prevalence of oral malodor in sexes(57.5% in male, 58.8% in female), and the prevalence rate was increased with aging. Self-rating intensity of oral malodor in oral malodor patients group(by self-reporting) was ranked in order of slight, weak, middle, strong in both sexes, but the number of self-rating strong female group is significantly larger than that of self-rating strong male group(9.3% in male, 17.9% in female).
In question on duration of oral malodor, most subjects answered that their oral malodor was developed in certain circumstances(61.3% in male, 76.3% in female), and oral malodor-developing circumstances was ranked in order of in the early morning, in hunger state, in fatigue, in stressful situations. Subjects effort for curing their oral malodor was ranked in order of more tooth brushing, gum chewing, use of commercial product for oral hygiene, visit dental clinic, and rates of no effort subjects were 15.3% in males and 10.7% in females. The degree of satisfaction with their efforts for curing their oral malodor was very low, only 5.6% of males and 6.6% of females were answered that there were satisfactory improvement in their oral malodor.
Collectively, our result revealed that prevalence of oral malodor in public Koreans and their interest in oral malodor were much higher than our anticipation, and that patients satisfaction with improvement in oral malodor was short of their expectations. Considering the life quality of patients suffering from oral malodor, we conclude that developments of more improved diagnostic tools and treatment methods for oral malodor is indispensable in future.
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