Temporomandibular disorder symptoms in young adults: Three‐dimensional impact on oral health‐related quality of life

• Published in: Journal of oral rehabilitation Vol. 49; no. 8; pp. 769 - 777
• Main Authors: Yap, Adrian Ujin, Tan, Sharon Hui Xuan, Marpaung, Carolina
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Wiley Subscription Services, Inc 01-08-2022
• Subjects: dental patient‐reported outcome measures; dental patient‐reported outcomes; oral health‐related quality of life; Oral hygiene; Pain; Quality of life; temporomandibular disorders; Temporomandibular joint disorders; Young adults; Temporomandibular disorders; Dental patient-reported outcomes; Dental patient-reported outcome measures; Oral health-related quality of life
• ISSN: 0305-182X; 1365-2842
• DOI: 10.1111/joor.13340

Background
The impact of temporomandibular disorders on functional, pain, and psychosocial aspect of patients' quality of life needed to be assessed.
Objectives
This study examined the three‐dimensional impact of pain‐related and/or intra‐articular Temporomandibular disorder (TMD) symptoms and ascertained the inter‐relationships between the functional, pain, and psychosocial aspects of oral health‐related quality of life (OHRQoL).
Methods
Young adults were enlisted from a local university and TMD symptoms were assessed with the Diagnostic Criteria for TMDs Symptom Questionnaire (DC/TMD‐SQ). Participants were stratified into those with no (NT), pain‐related (PT), intra‐articular (IT), and mixed (MT) TMD symptoms. OHRQoL was examined using the Oral Health Impact Profile‐14 (OHIP‐14), and dimensional effects (oral function [OF], orofacial pain [OP], and psychosocial impact [PI]) were established subsequently. Data were evaluated with Kruskal‐Wallis, Dunn, and Wilcoxon signed‐rank tests (α = .05).
Results
The mean age of the participants (n = 1205) was 7 ± 1.3 years (71.8% women). While 42.2% reported no TMD symptoms, 22.3%, 16.9%, and 18.5% had PT, IT, and MT accordingly. The MT, PT, and IT groups presented higher total OHIP‐14 and dimension scores than the NT group (p < .01). Scores were also significantly different between the MT and IT groups except for OF. For all TMD groups, the ranking of dimensional impact was OP > PI > OF, and associations between the OP and PI dimensions were the strongest (correlation coefficient [rs] = .57–.76).
Conclusions
Young adults with PT and/or IT symptoms have poorer OHRQoL, especially in the OP and PI dimensions, which were moderate to strongly correlated. The use of the three dental Patient‐reported Outcome (dPRO) dimensions could provide construct equivalency among OHRQoL measures.
Young adults with TMD symptoms have poorer quality of life compared to the ones without, especially in orofacial pain and psychosocial impact aspects. Both aspects have a moderate to strong correlation in young adults with TMD symptoms.