Awareness and knowledge of prophylaxis for infective endocarditis in patients with severe rheumatic heart disease.

Prevention of infective endocardit s (IE) is mportant because it has a high mortalty rate.This study sets out to to gather information from patients who were at risk of developing IE of their knowledge of the need for prophylaxis for the disease. Forty-one black patients suffering from severe rheumatic heart disease (RHD) were interviewed. Only one patient (2.4%) was regularly visiting a dentist to maintain good oral health and only five (12.2%) had received advice about the need for antibiotic cover prior to dental extraction. The vast majority of patients (97.5%) visited a dentist only when driven by dental pain, 36.6 % had to travel for more than an hour to reach their nearest dentist, and 87.8% indicated that they brushed their teeth. It may be concluded that in this group of black patients with severe RHD there was a lack of knowledge of the need for and of measures recommended for prophylaxs against IE. In addition, attempts by the health care team to ensure good oral health and access to dental care for these patients were inadequate, if not non-existent.