Bad habits in oral hygiene on campus: to change or not to change, that’s the question!

Abstract

Oral health behaviours are fundamental for health, but few studies have been focused on them, particularly on university students. This study aims to describe st udent s’ oral hygiene behaviours, perceptions about campus facilities concerning oral hygiene, and readiness to change oral behaviours. Participants were 403 college students from University of Minho, attending different courses; 70.5% were female. The mean age was 22.74 (s.d.= 4.74). The percentage of students that self-report absence of daily oral care was 61.5. The majority of students (88.6%) have meals on campus, however only 20.7% practiced oral health behaviours. Only 10.4% evaluated campus’ conditions to promote oral hygiene as “good” or “very good”. If conditions improved, 40.4% would think about changing their behaviours and 29% would effectively change them. These results reveal the urgency to improve oral hygiene habits on campus and encourage the development of health promotion programmes.