Exploring the Associations between Poverty, Poor Oral Health, and Quality of Life in Saskatoon

The DIRECT Dental clinic, which stands for Dental Initiative Rendering Emergency Care Treatment, situated in the College’s Saskatoon West Dental Clinic, provided free dental care to individuals in need over the course of 10 weekends throughout the year. [...] This situation is concerning as the rise in cost of dental care in Canada has been outpacing both inflation and the average salary of the lowest economic groups over the last 25 years. [...] Here, the oral health Individuals on social assistance quality of life can be measured using the feel powerless in taking the first Oral Health Impact Profile (OHIP)-14, which step to reducing the burden of is a validated questionnaire that measures oral disease and admit that it has people’s perception of the social impact of a large impact on their ability to oral disorders on their well-being. [...] The overall purpose of this research is to examine how improving the oral health of people living in poverty and/or experiencing homelessness in Saskatoon can facilitate their social and professional integration and therefore, ultimately, reduce poverty. [...] To assess how access to oral health care affects the oral health status, self-esteem, and quality of life for individuals living in poverty in Saskatoon S T U D Y F I N D I N G S 189 For this research, we used a cross-sectional survey targeting individuals living in poverty in participants completed the Saskatoon.