Patient presentation at medical practices with dental problems: an analysis of the 1996 General Practice Morbidity Database for Wales

Objective To describe the characteristics of attendances and patients who present to family medical practitioners with oral or dental problems. Design Secondary analysis of standard consultation data. Setting 30 family medical practices in the General Practice Morbidity Database for Wales. Subjects All patients who presented at the practices with an oral or dental complaint during 1996. Results Of the 1,650,882 patient attendances at the 30 medical practices in the study year, 4,891 (0.3%) were for oral/dental problems. The frequency of these attendances varied considerably between practices (ranging from 0.02 to 0.67% of all attendances); 44.2% of the attendances included tooth-related problems, and 42.3% were for diseases of soft tissue, salivary glands or the tongue. On average patients with dental problems attended their doctor twice as frequently as other patients. The majority (75%) of oral/dental attendances were related solely to these problems. Patients with tooth-related dental problems were three times more likely to seek treatment at weekends than patients attending for other reasons. Conclusions The rate of attendance for oral/dental problems varies substantially between practices, but is generally low The higher rate of attendance for tooth-related problems at weekends suggests that some of the attendances for oral problems might be related to a perceived or actual lack of dental services at these times.