Bruxism association with emotional stress: transversal study

Abstract

The aim of this paper work was to evaluate the prevalence of bruxism among members of Brazilian Navy serving in operative and administrative areas, verifying the existence of an association with emotional stress. 486 militaries were evaluated and submitted to the Lipp Inventory of Adults Stress Symptoms as to clinical examinations and anamnesis. A prevalence of 35,6% of militaries with bruxism was observed and the administrative group was the most prevalent. 103 pacients were also identified in the sample with stress symptoms, of which 55.33% showed no clinical evidence of bruxism and 44.66% showed clinical evidence of bruxism. A positive correlation between emotional stress and bruxism was also observed and the prevalence of bruxism found in the sample was bigger than that found in literature to the population in general.