Evaluation of chewing performance and quality of life on implant overdenture

Conventional complete dentures are a treatment method that has been applied for centuries in cases of edentulism. However the quality of life of those who use conventional complete dentures in the lower jaw is adversely affected due to problems such as retention and lack of stability, sore, pain and nutritional deficiency. Two-implant overdentures were determined as the first treatment option in cases of complete edentulism according to the 2002 McGill consensus. Various objective and subjective measurement methods have been developed to evaluate chewing performance. In recent years, chewing performance has been evaluated by analyzing the standard deviation of the hue of the two-color gum with software (VOH, Viewgum). An easy-to-apply, inexpensive and standardization-based evaluation is provided by this method. In this study, chewing test was performed using Hue-Check Gum® and VividentFruitSwing "Watermelon and Asai Grape" gums on patients using two implant-supported or conventional full dentures in the lower jaw. OHIP-14, OHIP-EDENT, GOHAI and VAS scales were applied to evaluate the quality of life (OHRQoL) and satisfaction. Chewing performance of implant overdentures is better than conventional full dentures when evaluated with hue check gum. It was seen that there was no significant difference between the two groups, when evaluated with Vivident gum. It was observed that those who used implant overdentures showed higher satisfaction values in general comfort, stability, chewing, speaking and aesthetic scales evaluated with the VAS scale compared to those using conventional complete denture; however, there was no statistically significant difference in terms of pain. As a conclusion, OHRQoL of implant overdenture users was found to be higher than those using conventional complete dentures.