2018 Volume 68 Issue 1 Pages 28-35
The purpose of this study was to investigate oral healthcare research trends in the nursing field and assess the association between these trends and oral healthcare policies. We performed a literature search of the Ichushi-Web database from January 1, 2000 to December 31, 2016, using the search words of “oral healthcare” and “nurse.” Studies for which we could not identify the types of subjects or site where the study had been performed in Abstract and review literature without study data were excluded from this analysis. The annual numbers of studies from 2000 to 2016 were counted to estimate the trends in research activities related to oral healthcare. The chi-squared test identified an association between an increase in the number of studies and the start of perioperative oral function management coverage by medical insurance. A total of 308 studies were collected for analysis. The majority of studies were conducted in hospitals, but a few studies were conducted in nursing facilities, communities, and homes. The number of studies in hospitals increased over the previous year, when the medical service fee for the flat-fee payment system, called Diagnosis Procedure Combination (DPC), and nutrition management were introduced in 2006. Similarly, the number of studies regarding collaborative oral healthcare or oral healthcare support teams for patients in hospitals increased significantly when the medical service fee for nutrition management and management by the nutrition support team were introduced in 2006 and 2010. There was a significant correlation between the introduction of medical insurance coverage of perioperative oral function management in 2012 and the increase in the number of studies on perioperative oral healthcare (p<0.01). However, the increase in the number of studies was not associated with the revised nursing insurance programs or other oral healthcare policies.
Therefore, this study suggested that the medical insurance policies regarding oral healthcare were associated with the trends in oral healthcare research in the nursing fields.
