PRLog (Press Release)- Feb. 10, 2014 - CALABASAS, Calif. — A team of scientists may have found a way to precisely detect and monitor the specific activity surrounding peoples’ oral behavior.

According to MedicalNewsToday.com, researchers from Taiwan University have developed a tooth sensor that embeds within a single tooth. The tiny sensor, which uses small wires to carry data to a computer, can yield a wealth of information about what the patient eats, drinks, smokes, breathes, and more.

The researchers said they were motivated to create the device because most oral activities “produce a unique teeth motion.” They said the sensor can measure this jaw movement and build “classifiers” that can categorize various mouth activities.

The team tested the sensor by having eight participants wear the device while performing different activities such as chewing gum and talking. Meanwhile, the computer analyzed the data and built a personal profile for their oral activities. Using this personal profile, the scientists said the tooth sensor was almost 94% accurate in recognizing the participants’ oral behavior.

The team said the information collected can greatly help dentists and doctors monitor their patient’s health.

Los Angeles dentist Dr. Greg Rubin, of the Calabasas Dental Institute, says the sensor may prove to be a unique tool that can offer great benefits in how he treats patients.

“If this sensor can indeed monitor a patient’s breathing and eating habits, then we may be able to alter the patient’s behavior and provide more personalized treatment,” he said.

“We would also be able to test the effectiveness of the treatment and check on the patient’s compliance in using a particular device or treatment. But I feel more research in this area is needed,” Dr. Greg Rubin said.

Source: PRLog

CHICAGO, Feb. 14, 2014 — The American Dental Association (ADA) and the American Association for Dental Research (AADR) have established the Evidence-Based Dentistry Faculty Award to acknowledge a dental school faculty member who has made significant contributions to implement and advance evidence-based dentistry (EBD).

Applicants must be an ADA or AADR member, a full or part- time faculty member at a US dental school and have completed an EBD-related project within the last two years. One application per dental school will be accepted. The recipient will receive a $1,000 award at the AADR’s Fall Focus Symposium Oct. 7-8, which will be held in conjunction with the ADA Annual Meeting in San Antonio.

“This will be a wonderful opportunity to acknowledge faculty members who demonstrate leadership in implementing EBD in research, practice or education, or contribute to the scientific knowledge base of EBD,” said Leslie Winston, DDS, PhD, Director Professional and Scientific Relations at Procter and Gamble Professional Oral Health.

EBD focuses on providing personalized dental care based on the most current scientific knowledge. EBD integrates scientific evidence, the patient's oral and medical condition, medical history and treatment preferences, and the dentist's clinical judgment. The Evidence-Based Dentistry Faculty Award is supported by a contribution from Procter & Gamble.

Award applications will be accepted until June 30. For additional eligibility requirements and application information, please contact Malavika Tampi at tampim@ada.org or 312-440-2511.

Chicago, Feb. 13, 2014 – Screenings by dentists for the most common chronic medical diseases could save the American healthcare system as much as $102.6 million annually, according to a new study conducted by the ADA Health Policy Resources Center (HPRC).

The findings were published Feb. 13 in the American Journal of Public Health.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 7.8% of the US population has undiagnosed hypertension, 2.7% has undiagnosed diabetes, and 8.2% has undiagnosed high cholesterol. Screening for these conditions in dental offices could lead to savings of up to $102.6 million, or $33 per person screened, and healthier outcomes for patients.

“As many as 27 million people visit a dentist but not a physician in a given year,” said Kamyar Nasseh, PhD, lead author of the study. “This presents an opportunity for dentists to be part of an integrated healthcare team working to combat chronic illnesses.”

There is potential for additional savings over the long term through prevention, health promotion, and early interventions that the study did not model.

“We have long known that the mouth is the window to the body,” said ADA President Charles H. Norman, DDS. “But we have an increased understanding about roles that dentists can play in detecting chronic, systemic disease. This study shows that dentists can contribute to reduced healthcare costs in the U.S. by screening for chronic conditions.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about half of all American adults suffer from chronic illnesses, which account for more than 75% of healthcare costs and 70% of deaths each year in the United States. Chronic diseases are estimated to cost the country $153 billion annually in lost productivity.

CHICAGO, Feb. 13, 2014 — The American Dental Association (ADA) Council on Scientific Affairs has named Noor Obaisi, DDS, MS as the recipient of its first John W. Stanford New Investigator Award. Dr. Obaisi, who completed an orthodontic residency program at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry in May 2013, works in private practice in Chicago.

Dr. Obaisi will present her winning research project, "Determination of the Transformation Temperature Ranges of Orthdontic Nickel-Titanium Archwires," at the March 9-11, 2015, ADA Standards Committee on Dental Products annual meeting in Charlotte, NC.

The John W. Stanford New Investigator Award honors the legacy of Dr. Stanford who is credited with establishing the ADA's current standards program. Dr. Stanford died in February 2011. He was a 40-year ADA employee and played a pivotal part in standards setting and development.

The Stanford New Investigator Award underscores the crucial role that dental standards play in patient health and safety and in the efficacy of dental products while paying homage to Dr. Stanford's contribution.

Applications for the Stanford New Investigator Award are accepted annually from dental students or dentists who have earned their DDS or DMD degrees no more than five years prior to the time of selection. Submissions must be original research that addresses some aspect of the use of standards in dental research or clinical application. Applications are being accepted through Sept. 30 for the 2014 award.

To apply for the John W. Stanford New Investigator Award or learn more about the ADA Standards Programs, please visit ADA.org/dentalstandards.

WITTEN, Germany – Researchers from Germany investigated the effectiveness of basic root canal treatment (BRT) with tactile working length determination compared with BRT with standard radiographic working length control and found that tactile working length determination achieves comparable treatment outcomes in terms of radiographic and clinical outcome parameters, according to Dental Tribune. The researchers determined the treatment to be an accurate method in BRT.

The study, titled “Clinical effectiveness of basic root canal treatment after 24 months: A randomised controlled trial,” is published online ahead of print in the Journal of Endodontics.

To read the full Dental Tribune article, click here.

Feb. 11, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Children should begin using toothpaste with fluoride as soon as they get their first tooth, according to updated American Dental Association (ADA) guidelines.

To help prevent cavities, parents should use a smear (an amount about the size of a grain of rice) of fluoride toothpaste for children younger than 3 years old and a pea-sized dab for those aged 3 to 6, the association recommends.

Previous guidelines recommended using water to brush the teeth of children younger than age 2 and brushing the teeth of children aged 2 to 6 with a pea-sized amount of fluoride toothpaste.

"For half a century, the ADA has recommended that patients use fluoride toothpaste to prevent cavities, and a review of scientific research shows that this holds true for all ages," Dr. Edmond Truelove, chairman of the ADA's Council on Scientific Affairs, said in an association news release.

"Approximately 25% of children have or had cavities before entering kindergarten, so it's important to provide guidance to caregivers on the appropriate use of fluoride toothpaste to help prevent their children from developing cavities," Truelove said.

The ADA said the updated guidelines are meant to help prevent cavities in children while limiting their risk of fluorosis, which is a mild discoloration of the teeth.

Tooth decay is the most common chronic childhood disease in the United States, and more than 16 million American children have untreated cavities, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The new recommendations appear in the February issue of the Journal of the American Dental Association.

Source: HealthDay News

February 7, 2014 -- INTELIHEALTH - E-mailed referrals to a quit-smoking website are more effective than paper referrals, a new study suggests.

The National Dental PBRN Collaborative Group did the study. It included 100 dental offices in 8 states. They were all general-dentistry offices with Internet access. To be included in the study, an office had to see at least 5 adult smokers per week.

Each office was randomly assigned to provide either paper or electronic referrals.

The paper-referral group filled out forms for smokers. The forms provided the web address of Decide2Quit.org. They advised people to visit the site and register.

The e-referral group obtained smokers' email addresses and permission to use them. Smokers were sent e-mails with direct links to Decide2Quit.org. They were encouraged to visit and register. The e-mails continued for 4 weeks or until the smoker logged on to the website. Dentists also could provide paper-based information to smokers in this group.

There were minor differences between the paper and e-referral groups:

• The e-referral group had a higher percentage of African-American patients.

• Dentists in the e-referral group saw more smokers, on average, per week (about 20) than the paper referral group (about 16).

• The paper group had more existing procedures in place to help smokers quit than the e-referral group.

The study took place over 12 months. During that time, the paper group made 1,120 referrals. The e-referral group made 694. However, more smokers from the e-referral group registered on Decide2Quit.org. About 30% of e-referral smokers registered, compared with 8% of paper referral smokers.

In both groups, the patients who registered for the website were likely to be female and white and have at least some college education. Most smoked less than a pack a day. About 10% said they were not actually interested in quitting, even though they registered for the website.

Among the 258 people who registered on the website, 11.6% said they had quit smoking 6 months later. This is similar to rates reported by other web-assisted smoking cessation programs. People who were referred by e-mail were more likely to quit smoking. About 3% of e-referred smokers had quit 6 months later, compared with about 1% of paper-referred smokers.

The authors note the success of the e-referral program: There were 40% fewer e-referrals, but many more website registrations, as well as higher quit rates. They point out that e-referrals require slightly more effort on the part of the dental office. But the authors say that these referrals are effective and should be more fully explored.

The study appears in the February issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Source: InteliHealth News Service

FORT LAUDERDALE-DAVIE, Fla. – Linda Niessen, DMD, MPH, MPP, dean of the Nova Southeastern University (NSU) College of Dental Medicine, was recently elected as a council delegate representing the Dentistry and Oral Health Sciences Section of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). In this role, Niessen will serve a 3-year term.

The AAAS is an international non-profit organization dedicated to advancing science for the benefit of all people. AAAS seeks to advance science, engineering, and innovation throughout the world and publishes the journal, Science. AAAS Council considers matters relating to disciplinary section business and the organizational bylaws.

“It is truly an honor to be appointed to represent the field of dentistry and Nova Southeastern University in this major scientific organization,” said Niessen. “I look forward to working with my peers from throughout the country to advance our profession and support research and discoveries that will ultimately benefit patients throughout the globe.”

Niessen joined NSU in October 2013. She previously served as a clinical professor in the Department of Restorative Dentistry at Texas A&M University’s Baylor College of Dentistry. Niessen’s research interests include geriatric oral research and education, epidemiology of oral diseases in older adults, and oral health public policy.

Niessen received her bachelor’s degree in chemistry (Phi Beta Kappa) from the University of New Mexico and her Doctor of Dental Medicine (DMD), Master’s in Public Health (MPH) and Master’s in Public Policy (MPP), all from Harvard University.

HealthDay News -- Obese people who are diagnosed with tongue cancer might be at increased risk of dying from the disease, a small new study finds.

Researchers looked at about 150 people who had surgery for early stage squamous cell carcinoma of the tongue and found that obese patients had a five-fold increased risk of death.

Three years after surgery, 87% of normal-weight patients were alive, compared with 68% of obese patients, according to the findings, which were published recently in the journal Cancer.

The study is the first to link obesity and increased risk of death in patients with any type of head or neck cancer, the researchers said.

They said previous studies have found an association between obesity and worse outcomes among patients with several common cancers, including breast and colon cancers.

"The role of obesity across several common cancers is a focus of increased attention," study senior author Dr. Clifford Hudis, chief of breast cancer medicine at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, said in a center news release. Hudis is also president of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

Because the study was so specific in terms of the cancer's location in the body and disease stage, it helped clarify the effect of obesity, another researcher said.

"Most prior research investigating the interaction between [obesity] and head and neck cancers included multiple tumor sites and disease stages," study first author Dr. Neil Iyengar, a medical oncology and hematology fellow at Memorial Sloan Kettering, said in the news release. "Due in part to these confounding factors, it previously had been difficult to clearly understand the role of obesity in head and neck cancers."

"By focusing on a single site and a more select patient population, we designed our study to better identify new and relevant prognostic factors for this particular type of cancer, which could lead to further refined and tailored treatment strategies down the road," Iyengar said.

Although the study found an association between obesity in patients with tongue cancer and higher risk of death, it did not establish a cause-and-effect relationship.

SOURCE: HealthDay via Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, news release, Feb. 4, 2014

A Ostrow School of Dentistry of USC study has uncovered new details on how bundles of nerves and arteries interact with stem cells and also showcases revolutionary techniques for following the cells as they function in living animals.

Principal investigator Yang Chai, director of the Center for Craniofacial Molecular Biology at the Ostrow School and research associate Hu Zhao wrote the article, which appears Feb. 6 in the journal Cell Stem Cell.

The study focused on neurovascular bundles (NVB) — groupings of nerves and blood vessels intertwined throughout the body — and their interactions with mesenchymal stem cells, or MSC. The team specifically examined how the cells operated in the incisors of mice; those teeth continually regrow over a mouse’s life span, indicating that stem cells are present.

Typically, MSC are studied in vitro or harvested from animals and examined outside of their natural environment. However, Chai and his team used a different molecular marker to highlight the cells’ expression of the protein Gli1 and follow MSC in living mice. They discovered that the bundles are rich in stem cells, including MSC that wouldn’t have been detected using conventional markers and techniques.

It turns out that this newly uncovered population of MSC helps maintain a normal cellular environment, while stem cells normally detected by the more well-known markers focus on injury repair, Chai said.

“We have basically developed a system in which we can follow MSC in their natural environment and see how they contribute to homeostasis,” he said.

The study revealed that the MSC populations within NVB are located around arterioles — small arteries that branch off to bring blood to tissues. Sensory nerves within the bundles secrete a protein called Shh to regulate the stem cells, demonstrating a practical reason for the bundling of the nerves and blood vessels. Such bundles are a ubiquitous anatomical feature and are found in every organ in humans, Chai said.

The study highlights the need to cast a wider net in order to identify all stem cells. It also emphasizes the need to understand the environment around the cells, he added.

“This study has great implications for tissue regeneration in general,” Chai said. “If you want to regenerate tissue, you have to not only provide stem cells but also the proper neighborhood for them to carry out their function.

The study was supported by grants from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, National Institutes of Health (grant numbers R01 DE022503, U01 DE020065 and R01 DE012711) to Chai and training grant support from the NIDCR and NIH (R90 DE022528) to Zhao.

Source: USC News