• Armita Dehmoobadsharifabadi, Sonica Singhal, and Carlos Quiñonez.
• Dental Public Health, Faculty of Dentistry, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON. armita.dehmoobadsharifabad@alum.utoronto.ca.
• Can J Public Health. 2017 Mar 1; 107 (6): e538-e544.

ObjectivesTo compare physician and dentist visits nationally and at the provincial/territorial level and to assess the extent of the "inverse care law" in dental care among different age groups in the same way.MethodsPublicly available data from the 2007 to 2008 Canadian Community Health Survey were utilized to investigate physician and dentist visits in the past 12 months in relation to self-perceived general and oral health by performing descriptive statistics and binary logistic regression, controlling for age, sex, education, income, and physician/dentist population ratios. Analysis was conducted for all participants and stratified by age groups - children (12-17 years), adults (18-64 years) and seniors (65 years and over).ResultsNationally and provincially/territorially, it appears that the "inverse care law" persists for dental care but is not present for physician care. Specifically, when comparing to those with excellent general/oral health, individuals with poor general health were 2.71 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.70-2.72) times more likely to visit physicians, and individuals with poor oral health were 2.16 (95% CI: 2.16-2.17) times less likely to visit dentists. Stratified analyses by age showed more variability in the extent of the "inverse care law" in children and seniors compared to adults.ConclusionsThe "inverse care law" in dental care exists both nationally and provincially/territorially among different age groups. Given this, it is important to assess the government's role in improving access to, and utilization of, dental care in Canada.

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