No Joke: Check Teeth if Parents Are in Nursing Homes
Want to know the best way to tell whether your parent in a nursing home is doing well? Open his mouth. A shocking number of nursing home residents rarely if ever have their teeth looked at, according to Catherine Saint Louis, and though you might think it's just teeth, infection in gums from poor dental hygiene can lead to life-threatening illnesses like pneumonia, one of the number-one killers of those living in nursing homes. "In nursing homes across the country, residents. . . are plagued by cavities, gum disease and cracked teeth, in part because their mouths are not kept clean," Saint Louis writes. And nursing home personnel, spending most of their time helping residents to the toilet, being fed, or repositioned in bed, just don't have much to spend on dental hygiene, even just brushing teeth. “I always say you can measure quality in a nursing home by looking in people’s mouths, because it’s one of the last things to be taken care of,” Dr. Judith A. Jones...