Introduction. Dental status of most people with special needs is not
satisfactory. Many of them are edentulous or toothless, with acute extensive
caries lesions present, high DMFT index and severe periodontal disease. The
objective of this study was to examine the dental status of mentally impaired
persons who live in the special institution ?Srce u jabuci? in Pancevo.
Material and Methods. Clinical examination was performed on 114
institutionalized patients (68 male and 46 female), age 22 to 71 years.
Patients were divided in two groups; the first group consisted of 71 persons
who had a moderate mental disorder (F71), while the second group included
43 respondents with severe mental retardation (F72). Oral examination
revealed: the number of present teeth, caries lesions, the presence of
restorations, the number of extracted teeth, the presence of residual roots,
fractures and the presence and number of fixed restorations. Results. The
mean DMFT of total examined teeth was 20.33?7.63. The greatest percentage
found for extracted teeth (63.76%): in the first group 63.23%, and in the
second 64.06%. The percentage of teeth that had caries lesions of all
examined teeth was 33.48%, while the lowest percentage was for restored teeth
(2.76%). In majority of examined people, initial caries, deep caries, or
tooth with the exposed pulp (K1 - 51.74% K2 - 40.35%, K3 - 51.75%) were not
found. A high percentage of examined people had more than 10 extracted teeth
(52.63%). Most of them did not have any restoration in the mouth (81%) and
only three persons had fixed denture. Conclusion. Dental status of
institutionalized mentally impaired persons showed high prevalence of
extracted teeth, significant presence of carious lesions and small percentage
of restored teeth with inadequate oral hygiene.