Association between Oral Health and Frailty among Older Adults in Madinah, Saudi Arabia: A Cross-Sectional Study

Objectives This study aimed to examine the association between normative and subjective oral health indicators and frailty assessed by Frailty Phenotype (FP) and frailty index (FI) among older Saudi adults. Design Cross-sectional study. Setting community and hospital-based. Participants Participants were 356 community-dwelling older adults attending dental clinics and social centres at Madinah, Saudi Arabia. Methods Frailty was measured with the frailty phenotype and a 34-item FI. Oral health included the following measures: self-rated oral health, number of teeth, and functional dentition. Covariates included sociodemographic factors and nutritional status. Logistic regression and negative binomial regression models were constructed to test the association between oral health indicators, FP, and FI, respectively. The first model was adjusted for demographic and socioeconomic factors, the second model was additionally adjusted for nutritional status. Results The number of teeth, functional dentition and self-rated oral health showed significant associations with frailty after adjusting for demographic and socioeconomic variables for both FP and FI. Adjusting for nutritional status attenuated the associations. Conclusion This study has shown significant associations between oral health indicators namely number of teeth, functional dentition and self-rated oral health, and both FP and FI among Saudi older adults. Nutritional status appeared to mediate the association between oral health and frailty implicating inability to eat in this relationship.