口腔衛生に関する消費者意識と行動からみた 補助的清掃用具普及の課題

摘要

It has been reported that the maintenance of the health of the mouth and teeth plays an important role in improving the quality of life. However usage rate of auxiliary cleaning tools such as essential dental floss, interdental brush, and part for toothbrush should be estimated low from the viewpoint of maintenance of the mouth and teeth related health. Then, the authors investigated the consumers' awareness of mouth and teeth and actual use of auxiliary cleaning tools in order to promote products' development and construction 01information to encourage the use of ancillary equipment. As a result, 5 factors, i. e.， "unhealthy teeth", "oral care focus", "mouth discomfort", "worry about the public eye" and "awareness teeth weak" were extracted by factor analysis of awareness and attitude items. The relationship was observed between the usage of auxiliary cleaning tool and other some variables: "oral care focus" factor, subjective health feeling, life satisfaction, and so on. It was suggested that the desirable strategy is to transmit information such as the effect of the usage of auxiliary cleaning tool on life satisfaction and health awareness, and importance of regular checkups by the dentist. Additionally, there were observed not a few cases that people with weak teeth did not use auxiliary cleaning even if they were conscious of the bad condition of the teeth. It can be concluded that steadily delivering information to the people of low consciousness is one of the most important subjects in the consumer education relevant to oral health care.%歯や口の健康が生活の質の向上に重要な役割を持つことが報告されてが，歯や口の健康を保つために必須なデンタルフロス，歯間ブラシ，部分用ハブラシといった補助的清掃用具の使用率は低いのが現状である.そこで，これら補助的清掃用具の使用を促す情報開発や商品開発の一助とするため，消費者の補助的清掃用具の使用実態と歯や口に対する意識について調査した.その結果，歯や口の意識•態度項目の因子分析により抽出した「オーラルケア注力」因子や，主観的健康感，生活満足感と補助的清掃用具使用との関係性が認められた.歯科医への定期健診の啓発に加え，補助的清掃用具使用による健康や生活満足度への効果など，消費者メリットにつながる情報発信が効果的であると考えられる.また，歯が弱いと自覚しながら補助的清掃用具を使用していない実態も認められた.オーラルケアの低意識層にまで情報を確実に伝達することが重要な課題として抽出できた.