Oral epidemiological survey, self-esteem and quality of life of HIV / AIDS patients: Cross-sectional exploratory study

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study was to evaluate the systemic condition, oral health, quality of life and self-esteem in patients with HIV / AIDS and to verify the possible associations between them.

Material and Methods: It is a cross-sectional study carried out in the Specialized Attention Service linked to the Faculty of Medicine. As inclusion criteria, patients with HIV positive diagnoses who agreed to participate in the study. Individuals who were illiterate, deprived of liberty, and those with some cognitive difficulty were excluded. For the data collection, the oral examination was performed, using the CPO-D indexes (caries teeth, lost and filled teeth) and IHOS (index of simplified oral hygiene), as recommended by the World Health Organization and through the Scale of Self-esteem by Rosenberg. The data analysis was applied the Spearman Correlation Coefficient by Positions, Williams-corrected G test and Chisquare test, in the SPSS 22.0 Program.

Results: A total of 146 HIV-positive patients participated in the study, most of them male (61.64%), with a mean age of 44 years and a basic / fundamental level of education (50%). Regarding oral health, the mean DMFT was 14.31 and the IHOS was regular in 38.36% of the sample. The majority of the patients had no symptoms of depression (60.28%) and 52.06% presented positive self-esteem. Low selfesteem presented a negative correlation with the sexual activity domains (p = 0.005), life satisfaction (p = 0.040) and HIV awareness (p = 0.026).

Conclusion: The results suggest that the oral health condition was considered to be regular and self-esteem was classified as positive, but some variables interfered negatively in the domains of quality of life.