Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
Filter by Categories
Academy Activities- ADI Comments
Academy Activities- ADI Convocations
Academy Activities- ADI Cover story
Academy Activities- ADI International projects
Case Report
Editorial
Guest Editorial
Letter to Editor
Letter to the Editor
Opinion Corner
Opinion Piece Article
Opinion Piece Articles
Original Research Article
Policy Papers
Research Article
Review Article
Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis
Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
Filter by Categories
Academy Activities- ADI Comments
Academy Activities- ADI Convocations
Academy Activities- ADI Cover story
Academy Activities- ADI International projects
Case Report
Editorial
Guest Editorial
Letter to Editor
Letter to the Editor
Opinion Corner
Opinion Piece Article
Opinion Piece Articles
Original Research Article
Policy Papers
Research Article
Review Article
Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis
View/Download PDF

Translate this page into:

Editorial
2 (
1
); 1-2
doi:
10.25259/JGOH_53_2019

Access to oral health-care and inequalities

Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Balaji Dental and Craniofacial Hospital, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India.

*Corresponding author: Dr. S. M. Balaji, Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Balaji Dental and Craniofacial Hospital, No. 30, K.B. Dasan Road, Teynampet, Chennai - 600 018, Tamil Nadu, India. smbalaji@gmail.com

Licence
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-Share Alike 4.0 License, which allows others to remix, tweak, and build upon the work non-commercially, as long as the author is credited and the new creations are licensed under the identical terms.

How to cite this article: Balaji SM. Access to oral health-care and inequalities. J Global Oral Health 2019;2(1):1-2.

Access to health-care deserves to be basic right to every human. All humans irrespective of any factor deserve an equal opportunity for a reasonably long, healthy, and productive life. However, in real-world situations, the health access remains different between nations, regions, and even at subregional levels. Quite recently, the Global Burden of Diseases study group published the health-care access inequalities in the world, using sociodemographic index (SDI) as a comparing parameter in the time period of 1990–2017. This SDI is a novel, combined indicator of measures of income, education, and fertility. The study proceeded to identify wide disparities among nations and even in specific regions within countries. They also observed a uniform trend of relatively smaller burden in countries that are traditionally held as wealthy. Lifestyle disorders such as, high blood pressure, high body mass index, diet, and high fasting plasma glucose are significant risk factors. Furthermore, the use of illicit drugs, use of tobacco, and alcohol use disorders were also significantly related to health-care access inequalities. Their findings can be extrapolated to design pertinent research studies to identify the root causes of such disparities and develop evidence-based solutions to improve health and health equity.[1]

This is very interesting and pertinent to relate to oral health-care access. It is common knowledge that oral health-care access remains distributed in a skewed fashion since the 16th century.[2] India and Southeast Asia top such a list.[3] While there could be a huge list of factors that could prevent the oral health-care access inequalities, there are no studies in literature that has systematically and periodically assessed the inequalities. Such a study on a global or a regional study would help the policy-makers to find the list of diseases and conditions that predispose to poor oral health as well as remain as a crucial factor that influences the oral health-care access. Influence of non-communicable diseases on this would be an added factor that needs to be studied. When such lists of factors are collected with evidence of involvement, it would be easier for the policy- makers to design solutions.

It is the need of the hour for the oral health-care fraternity to accept, identify, and quantify the presence of oral health-care inequalities and the factors that cause them. It would be needed to provide oral health and systemic health to all.

Financial support and sponsorship

Nil.

Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts of interest.

Disclaimer

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Journal or its management.

References

  1. , , , , , , et al. Global, regional, national, and subnational big data to inform health equity research: Perspectives from the global burden of disease study 2017. Ethn Dis. 2019;29:159-72.
    [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. . Indian oral health inequalities. Indian J Dent Res. 2018;29:404.
    [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. . Burden of dental diseases in India as compared to South Asia: An insight. Indian J Dent Res. 2018;29:374-7.
    [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Fulltext Views
3,915

PDF downloads
5,123
View/Download PDF
Download Citations
BibTeX
RIS
Show Sections