dental care and oral hygiene practices in longterm geriatric care institutions this study evaluated the activities of dentists dental care and oral hygiene practices in the longterm care institutions of belo horizonte minas gerais brazil a semistructured questionnaire was handed out to the coordinators of 37 philanthropic and 30 private institutions the data was compared by the chisquare and fishers exact tests 81 of the questionnaires were answered the majority of the private 742 and philanthropic institutions 87 do not have a dentist p021 the location period of existence type institution kind and number of residents werent factors regarding the presence of a dentist p005 67 of the philanthropic institutions with equipped consultation rooms had dentists though there were none when there was no consultation room even without consultation rooms 13 of the private institutions had dentists when necessary 696 of the philanthropic institutions refer the elderly to public health centers while 581 of the private institutions refer them to their family dentists a higher percentage of the private institutions adopted systematic oral hygiene procedures p001 with a considerable divergence of treatment reported there is a need to include a dentist on the health staff in the institutions and for systematization of oral hygiene practices