Background: Patient-centered outcomes are being given great attention by the dental scientific community. The Oral Health Impact Profile -14 questionnaire (OHIP-14) has been introduced to address patients' success criteria when describing the impact of oral rehabilitations on quality of life (OHrQoL).
Methods: Thirty-five patients wearing a full-arch implant-prosthesis being in place between 4 and 6 years before this analysis were considered eligible and then enrolled in the present retrospective study. According to their prosthetic anamnesis, two groups were defined: delayed loading group (IL-group) and immediate loading group (IL-group). At the moment of analysis, clinical and radiographic parameters were collected, and patients were asked to complete the Oral Health Impact Profile -14 questionnaire (OHIP-14) in order to measure their OHrQoL.
Results: Independent t-test showed total OHIP-14 scores to be not significantly different between groups; however, the domains "functional limitation" and "physical disability" resulted significantly higher in patients within the DL-group. On the contrary, social disability was higher in the IL-group. When the comparison was performed taking sex into account, no significant differences between groups were highlighted. Instead, the stratification for years of follow-up led to significant evidences. When the follow-up was shorter (less-than-5 years), the functional limitation reported scores were higher.
Conclusions: Within the limitations of this study, the analysis supports the absence of significant differences between immediate loading and delayed loading full-arch protocol in term of clinical, radiological parameters and OHrQoL.