Background: Oral frailty is a major global public health issue faced by the elderly, significantly affecting the rehabilitation of elderly patients. The relationships among the three variables—social support, dyadic coping, and oral frailty—remain unclear, especially the mediating role of dyadic coping, which has not been adequately studied and explored in the context of elderly ovarian cancer patients. Patients and Methods: This cross-sectional study adopted consecutive sampling to select elderly ovarian cancer patients treated at a Grade-A Tertiary Hospital in Hangzhou, China, from January 1, 2023 to December 31, 2025. The survey was conducted using a general information questionnaire, Oral Frailty Index-8, Social Support Rating Scale, and Dyadic Coping Scale. Results: This study included a total of 311 elderly ovarian cancer patients. The oral frailty score is 5.31± 0.98 (57.4% prevalence), 37.82± 7.98 in social support, 112.18± 21.21 in dyadic coping. Logistic regression analysis revealed that non-residence with children, chronic disease history (≥ 3), polypharmacy, and lack of oral health education were significant predictors of oral frailty (P< 0.05). The total social support score showed positive correlations with dyadic coping, positive dyadic coping, and negative dyadic coping. Conversely, the total oral frailty score exhibited negative correlations with all three dyadic coping dimensions. Social support showed a negative correlation with oral frailty. The mediating effect of positive dyadic coping between social support and oral frailty was-0.023, accounting for 23.8% of the total effect. The mediating effect of Negative dyadic coping was 0.01, contributing 10.8% to the total effect. Conclusion: The incidence of oral frailty is higher in elderly ovarian cancer patients in China. Do not live with their children, a history of chronic diseases (≥ 3), use multiple medications, lack of oral health education are more prone to oral frailty. Social support maybe affect the level of oral frailty through dyadic coping. Suggesting that healthcare professionals may actively attempt to establish intervention programs based on dyadic coping levels with good social support, improve the dyadic coping levels of elderly ovarian cancer patients, may be linked to decreased risk of oral frailty. Keywords: aged, ovarian cancer, dyadic coping, oral frailty, social support, mediating effect
Jin et al. (Wed,) studied this question.