Epidemiology: NHANES Surveys

The NHANES, or National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, is a series of surveys conducted in the United States beginning in the 1960s to examine the oral and nutritional status of a large, representative population. A paper published in 2007 described the trends in oral health status based on data collected from people aged 2 years and over from 1988–1994 and 1999–2004.¹⁰ Two more papers reported on the information from the 2005-2008¹¹ and 2011-2012¹² surveys. The information collected focused on caries, dental history, tooth retention, edentulism (tooth loss), periodontal status, and prosthodontic status. Conducted by the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), the data is released in two-year cycles for public use.

During the 2019–2020 cycle, data collection was disrupted in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, making the incomplete cycle not nationally representative. To compensate, NCHS combined the 2019–2020 data with the 2017–2018 data and adjusted sampling parameters, such as primary sampling units and weights, to produce nationally representative data covering 2017 through March 2020 (pre-pandemic).¹³ A detailed report from NCHS outlines the methodology used to create the combined dataset and provides analytical guidance for its use. The most recent NHANES survey¹⁴ clearly indicates that oral health has improved for most Americans compared to the 2011–2012 survey period. What follows are some of the most significant findings of the last surveys (2017–2018 and 2019–2020).