Social inequalities in children's oral health-related quality of life: the Generation R Study

Contains fulltext : 182662.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access)PURPOSE: Oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) is the most important patient-reported outcome measure in oral health research. The purpose of the present research was to study the association of family socioeconomic position (SEP) with children's OHRQoL. METHODS: This cross-sectional study was embedded in the Generation R Study, a population-based cohort study conducted in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. For the present study, OHRQoL was assessed of 3871 ten-year old children. Family SEP was assessed with the following indicators: maternal/paternal education level, maternal/paternal employment status, household income, benefit dependency, and family composition. Linear regression analyses were performed to evaluate the (independent) associations of family SEP indicators with OHRQoL. RESULTS: The median (90% range) OHRQoL score of the participating children was relatively high [50.0 (43.0-53.0)]; however, OHRQoL was consistently lower in children with low family SEP. Positive associations were found for all SEP indicators (p-values