Abstract

In Chile in 2010, 600 athletes attended the National Olympic plan and participated in different international competitions. In addition to this, the program of “National sports projection” was implemented, which aims at the development and refinement of the morphological, motors and psychological foundations of athletes to keep them in optimal sports conditions. This program has defined a policy which aims to be highly scientific, with a strictly pedagogical methodology, according to the development and refinement of the morphological, motors and psychological foundations, for getting the appropriate sports form to each stage and level of age, through a healthy and successful system of sports preparation, insert on regional and national realities. It is therefore expected that high performance athletes have an optimal general health, since it is in direct relation to obtain improved sports performances; however, oral health is likely to be neglected as previous studies have shown [1-3]. Otherwise poor oral health could affect performance directly through pain arising from oral disease conditions but also more subtly from effects such as increased systemic inflammation and psychosocial impacts since in several sports body weight, composition and aesthetics are crucial factors to the athlete [3]. This study, according to our search, is the first that characterizes oral health of elite athletes in Chile, and contributes to improve the current evidence of poor sports performance being related to an impaired oral health.