Oral Health Promotion Mediated by Teledentistry in Community-dwelling Older Adults of La Araucanía Region, Chile

The goal of this randomized clinical trial is to compare the knowledge, attitudes, and oral health self-efficacy in self-sufficient elders aged over 60 years of 4 cities of La Araucanía región, Chile.

The main questions it aims to answer are:

* Can the development and implementation of a teledentistry strategy focused on community-dwelling older adults of the La Araucanía region improve participants' knowledge, attitudes, and self-efficacy in oral health?
* Could this teledentistry strategy have acceptability greater than 80%?

Participants will receive a dental-medical-geriatric diagnosis in a mobile dental clinic supported by a web platform called Teleplatform of Geriatric Dental Specialties (TEGO) and individual oral health education.

The researchers will compare a comparison group that will receive face-to-face individual oral health education with an intervention group, called tele-education group, that will receive educational reinforcement through a teledentistry strategy mediated by oral health educational videos sent via WhatsApp; to see if there are differences in the knowledge, attitudes, and oral health self-efficacy between the groups.

Access to oral health promotion for the elderly has been limited during their lifetime. The purpose of this study is the development and pilot implementation of an oral health promotion strategy mediated by teledentistry focused on community-dwelling older adults of the La Araucanía region. To this end, a randomized clinical trial is proposed with pre- and post-intervention tests to be carried out in a sample (n:120) of people over 60 years of age from 4 cities in this region. Both groups will undergo a dental-medical-geriatric diagnosis in a mobile dental clinic supported by a web platform called Teleplatform of Geriatric Dental Specialties (TEGO) and individual oral health education. The intervention group will also receive educational reinforcement through oral health videos sent via WhatsApp (Tele-education). The strategy will be evaluated through a questionnaire of knowledge, attitudes and self-efficacy in oral health that will be applied before and after the interventions received by both groups. The acceptability of the tele-educational strategy will be assessed. The statistical analysis contemplates the description of the sociodemographic profiles of the participants and the acceptability perceived by those who make up the tele-education group. The average of the scores obtained in the pre and post-test of the questionnaire will be compared within each group through the T-test for related samples and the average of the final scores will be compared between both groups through the T-test for independent samples. Likewise, the relationship between the post-test results, sociodemographic variables, and clinical variables will be evaluated through the Pearson Correlation Coefficient. A value of p \< 0.05 was chosen as the threshold for significance.

Eligibility Criteria:
Inclusion Criteria:

* Adults over 60 years of age residing in La Araucanía Region
* Self-valent (Barthel index ≥ 90)
* With access to a smartphone and internet
* Ability to follow instructions and adequate mobility to go up to a mobile dental clinic.

Exclusion Criteria:

* Subjects with cognitive impairment (Folstein Mini-Mental ≤ 24)
* Totally edentulous
* Those who do not use WhatsApp