Abstract
Objectives : This study was to examine the state of customized visiting oral health programs in a bid to help facilitate the unified operation of the programs and the development of required guidelines. Methods : The subjects in this study were 49 dental hygienists who were professionals responsible for customized visiting health care programs across the nation. Results : 1. Regarding the form of employment of the dental hygienists were investigated many contract and daily workers. 2. As to the possession of equipment necessary for visiting oral health programs, denture cleaners(12.2%) were most widely possessed in some regions, followed by mobile scalers(10.2%) and mobile suctions(8.2%). In terms of expendable devices and materials, dental mirrors, pincettes and explorers were the most widely possessed dental checkup devices, and the most widely possessed oral hygiene supplies were toothbrushes, interdental brushes and denture cleaners. Those devices and materials were in more possession than the other types of devices and materials. The most widely possessed equipment for educational purpose was laptop computers, followed by beam projectors and screens. The most widely possessed teaching materials were dentiform, followed by CD-ROMs. 3. Those whom they visited the most for oral health care service were elderly people, followed by the disabled and patients with chronic diseases. The dental hygienists who went out to visit those people outnumbered the others who stayed at public health centers. Concerning the types of visiting oral health care service, the most prevalent service provided to the elderly included denture cleaning/management, oral massage and preventive treatment against dental caries. The most dominant service provided to the disabled involved education of the oral health care act, preventive treatment against dental caries and toothbrushing by professionals. The most common service offered to patients with chronic diseases was education of the oral health care act and oral health education. The dental hygienists paid a visit to a mean of 5.8 households a day. The average weekly number of households cared by the dental hygienists was 27.3. It took a mean of 37.1 minutes for them to take care of each household. 4. As for satisfaction level with the implementation of the visiting oral health programs, they expressed the greatest satisfaction at teamwork with professionals($3.56{\pm}0.94$), followed by the professionalism of their work($3.21{\pm}0.94$) and workload($3.08{\pm}0.94$). Their satisfaction level with the work conditions required for creative job performance($2.75{\pm}0.98$) and partnership with other institutions($2.64{\pm}1.03$) was below 3.0. In regard to the impact of their characteristics, marital status made a statistically significant difference to satisfaction level with workload. The unmarried dental hygienists were more pleased with their workload than the married ones(p<0.05). 5. As to needs for education for professionalism improvement, they asked for education about visiting oral health care skills the most, followed by education about oral health care for patients with chronic diseases, education of planning/evaluation and education of oral health care for the disabled. Conclusions : The top priority for the vitalization of the programs was the procurement of budget, followed by the procurement of equipment and educational media and the procurement of human resources.
