Is the oral health-related quality of life associated with quality of life among pregnant Finnish families: a cross-sectional study

The objectives of this study was to find out if oral health-related quality of life and its dimensions (OHRQoL) are associated with overall quality of life (QoL) among mothers and fathers during pregnancy and whether these two constructs were associated within the family sharing the same living environment. The data (mothers n = 2580, fathers n = 1467) for this cross-sectional data study were collected from the FinnBrain Birth Cohort study during 2011–2015. OHRQoL was measured using a 14-item Oral Health Impact Profile (OHIP-14) questionnaire and QoL by using the WHOQoL-Bref questionnaire. Spearman correlation coefficients were used to assess the statistical significance of the associations. OHRQoL was weakly associated at the individual level with the overall QoL (mothers r = 0.21, fathers r = 0.22, p < 0.001), but the correlations within families were low for QoL and OHRQoL. Our findings suggest that overall QoL is a different construct than OHRQoL though slightly overlapping.

本研究旨在探究妊娠期父母的口腔健康相关生活质量（oral health-related quality of life, OHRQoL）及其维度与总体生活质量（overall quality of life, QoL）之间的关联，同时分析同住同一家庭的夫妻双方上述两种构念的相关性。本横断面研究的数据（母亲样本量n=2580，父亲样本量n=1467）采集自2011至2015年开展的FinnBrain出生队列研究。研究采用14条目口腔健康影响概况（Oral Health Impact Profile, OHIP-14）量表评估OHRQoL，以WHOQoL-Bref量表评估总体QoL。采用斯皮尔曼相关系数评估各关联的统计学显著性。在个体层面，OHRQoL与总体QoL呈弱相关（母亲组r=0.21，父亲组r=0.22，p<0.001），但家庭内部的QoL与OHRQoL相关性较低。本研究结果表明，尽管二者存在轻度重叠，但总体QoL与OHRQoL属于不同的构念。