This book provides a comprehensive review of the assessment and

management of older people’s oral health care needs. Discussing recent

initiatives to emphasize oral health promotion and prevention, the book

describes improvements in pharmacological and non-pharmacological

approaches for special populations in geriatrics and illuminates the

role of barriers to oral health care for older people. Divided into

three sections, the book first explores aging and oral health, including

age-related changes, epidemiology, nutrition, dysphagia, aspiration

pneumonia, xerostomia and hyposalivation, management of periodontal

disease and caries, systemic diseases that influence oral health, and

considerations for chronic orofacial pain. The second section

illuminates the ways in which frailty and other geriatric syndromes

influence oral health care in older adults with a special focus on

frailty, dementia, delirium and depression, and the delivery of oral

health care to vulnerable geriatric populations in long-term care, home

care, palliative care, and hospice. Lastly, the book addresses

inequalities in the oral health of older minority populations, the

disproportionate burden of oral disease and tooth loss, the contribution

of these issues to further complications in comorbidities, the

association of extended health literacy and periodontal disease, and the

social and cultural conditions that might be altered or improved by

healthcare programs and health policies.