Unveiling contradictions and incorporating best practices in the elderly's oral health

This paper presents and discusses the contradictions in the process of taking care of elderly's oral health in the perspective of the complex care and the logic of complexity, based on the Grounded Theory methodology. Nineteen people participated in the study, among elderly residents of long-term institutions, caregivers, directors, dentists and public health services managers. The emergent central category corresponds to the process of "Promoting oral health of the elderly in the context of long-term care institutions". Two levels were identified: one in which contradictions in the process of taking care of the elderly's oral health keeps the poor epidemiological status; and other, superior, that incorporates best practices in the structures and in the processes that form the promotion of the elderly's oral health care. To treat the elements that form the contradiction, without eliminating or disrespecting them, but working, looking for the improvement of each one, allows overcoming the contradiction, outlining the obstacle it represents. In the same way, the adoption of best practices can be considered a meta-viewpoint expressed to the elderly oral health care system, able to overcome the contradiction levels, as it is revealed here.

Elderly; care; oral health; theory of complexity