Page 26 - Impact of implant retained overdenture treatment and speech, oromyofunction, social participation and quality of life.
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Chapter 1
educational level of the patient are described as having an effect on patient related outcomes in dental treatment 48–50. Dentists experience difficulties treating certain patients, always coming back with complaints or questions about their dental situation. When looking back to the ICF-model, one has to take into account an important factor influencing the functioning of patients, namely personality. Personality is the set of psychological traits and mechanisms within the individual that influences our interaction with and adaptation to intrapsychic, physical and social environments 51. Personality may also affect the experiencing and reporting of health status and satisfaction with treatment. Despite a technically perfect treatment, some patients are still not satisfied with their oral situation 52,53 and personality traits may account for this differential experience 54–56.
Personality traits help to describe differences among people and contribute to our prediction of individuals’ future behavior. Personality traits demonstrated not only to be important to understand quality of life and interpersonal behavior, but also to comprehend health behavior and health perceptions 57. Umaki et al. (2012) suggested several reasons for non-compliance with oral hygiene measures, including the personality traits of neuroticism (N; emotional instability) and (low) conscientiousness (C; reliable, punctual and hardworking), but also stressful life events (e.g. death of a loved one, divorce, trauma,...) and health beliefs of the patient 58.
Research on the impact of prosthodontic treatment on quality of life and social relationships in patients almost exclusively relied on self-reports of experienced health status and interpersonal functioning. This type of evaluation is very important to understand the patients’ point of view and the perceived impact on their quality of life. Although self-reports provide insightful information, there is a methodological problem of self-reporting bias. Especially when patients have undertaken efforts such as invested time, undergoing surgery, financial consequences, their reported treatment impact may be biased 51. Costa and McCrae (1987) further argued that we cannot assume that people can rate their own health conditions accurately, because personality traits may bias the perception and reporting of medical symptoms. To overcome these biases, it is recommended to expand self-ratings with reports by an informed external observer who knows the daily functioning of the patient well. Including such






























































































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