Oral health in people with brain damage
Acquired brain damage is the disability resulting from the sequelae that remain in the person after a stroke or traumatic brain injury.
The maintenance of oral hygiene usually brings us back to dental cleanings, a cavity, or the discomfort caused by extraction. Minor annoyances are solved in short periods, which go little beyond the few minutes we dedicate to the three brushings of rigor. However, for a person with acquired brain damage, oral hygiene care can make the difference between proper nutrition and malnutrition, the ability to communicate appropriately with the people around them, and isolation, between a favorable prognosis for rehabilitation and stagnation or atony.
Acquired brain injury is the disability resulting from the sequelae that remain in the person after a stroke or traumatic brain injury (there are other causes, but they are in the minority). A person born without any damage to the brain suddenly has a brain injury due to one of the causes mentioned above and returns home with a disability and a wide range of associated problems and sequelae.
Among the most common consequences of brain damage are dysphagia, motor problems, muscular paralysis, and alterations in insensitivity. A series of sequelae that feedback, with enormous repercussions for the quality of life of the person, with the maintenance of proper oral hygiene. But it is also common for the brain-damaged person to have a lack of concentration, impulsivity or hyperactivity, memory and/or language impairment, mild behavioral alterations, and other multiple sequelae that make it practically impossible for them to attend a regular dental appointment.
The recommended model of care for acquired brain injury understands disability care from a comprehensive and interdisciplinary perspective, approached by different disciplines that act in coordination with the person and his or her family and social environment. It is a model focused on the person and his or her quality of life, individualized, where each aspect of health is essential for the maintenance or development of the person's capabilities according to objectives determined by his or her expectations, tastes, and needs.
