Two weeks ago, the 21st Winter Olympics ended with the passing on of the Olympic torch from Vancouver to Sochi in Russia. All the excitement and records aside, what remains are images of many athletes failing at their respective disciplines. Never before have the Games pushed the physical limits of what the human body can accomplish. Sadly, one athlete from Georgia lost his life after leaving the track at high speed during the men’s luge competition.

One major issue overshadowed by these tragedies is oral health. It seems that athletes and officials alike are not paying much attention to this problem, maybe because a healthy mouth and teeth are not considered relevant to top performance. This assumption is certainly wrong. Pain resulting from tooth decay, root-canal infection or gum disease can trouble athletes to such an extent that they are not able to compete. In addition, UV radiation accumulated over a long time in sports like the biathlon or crosscountry can significantly increase the risk of developing oral cancer.

The International Olympic Committee’s decision to screen more athletes for oral lesions this year is a step in the right direction and an acknowledgement that oral health forms part of general health. However, having these examinations every four years won’t change much in the general oral-health behaviour of athletes. Dentists, physicians and training staff need to drive home to them that a little investment in their mouths will help to remain more healthy not only during their active career, but also later in life.

Let’s hope that the competition for better oral health will already have begun when the Olympic flame shines over Sochi in 2014.

Similar to most health professionals, dentists have to face an array of hazards in their daily working lives. These are in the form of not only infectious diseases, but also substances found in dental materials and equipment that pose threats to dentists. Although these threats are not acute, studies have demonstrated that long-term exposure has the potential to damage their health.

Dentists traditionally place much trust in manufacturers, mainly because they have become comfortable using a certain product throughout their career and are hesitant to change. However, they should become more aware that they too are customers and if something seems odd, questions should be raised.

If products can be made safer for the health of the masses, they can certainly be made safer for professionals.

Given all of the recent hype, it is easy to think that the future of dentistry also lies in digital technology. According to industry experts, the advantages seem to be at hand. Tooth restorations and replacements, for example, will be less time consuming for the patient, saver and much more reliable.

However, while digital technology is a welcome advancement in most fields of dentistry, it is far from being a revolutionary paradigm shift. It may improve office efficiency or be useful for practice marketing, but it is not likely to make better dentists. The fundamentals of the profession basically remain the same. Whether these technologies will become a must-have for dental practices in the years to come will depend on their affordability and whether insurance companies are willing to reimburse treatment concepts based on them.

As a dental news company, we cannot turn a blind eye to these developments. With a new specialist title called CAD/CAM the international magazine of digital dentistry to be released this spring, we aim to inform you about the latest trends in all fields of digital dentistry. Therefore, the range of topics will include not only CAD/CAM, but also digital imaging or software processing.

If you are interested in receiving a sample copy, we invite you to check our website or visit our booths at all major dental trade shows this year.

The earthquake that struck Haiti in January will be remembered for a long time. Its devastating magnitude has spread desolation amongst the population and resulted in the gravest crisis in Haiti’s history, leaving behind a completely destroyed country with little likelihood of recovery without assistance. As the first Latin American nation, Haiti gained independence from France in 1804. Even before disaster struck on 12 January 2010, it had suffered deeply from poverty and political unrest. It is the duty of developed nations to help rebuild this nation so that our Haitian brothers can look forward to a new and improved country.

Many of our colleagues in Haiti have lost everything: family, work, resources and, even worse, hope. The dental profession cannot be oblivious to this reality. The Latin American Dental Federation (FOLA) has launched an international campaign to assist dental colleagues in Haiti by providing resources to rebuild their lives and their professional practices. FOLA, FDI, Dental Tribune and dentists from all over Latin America are making great efforts to collect instruments, materials and equipment to restore oral-health services in Haiti. We hope you also join us in this effort.

We are also planning a dental congress in the Dominican Republic to collect funds for the reconstruction of Haiti.

Dr Samuel Prophet, the President of the Association Dentaire Haitienne, wrote in an e-mail from Port-au-Prince to Dental Tribune Latin America: “Knowing that FOLA, FDI and Dental Tribune will help dentists in Haiti is great news because it gives us hope!”

This is a call to cooperate with us to help those who have been left without work or resources. Now is the time to show solidarity with our Haitian colleagues.

I just returned from the Greater New York Dental Meeting where I had the opportunity to conduct a number of interviews with well-known opinion leaders in dentistry.What struck me most about the line-up was that only 1 out of the 30 professionals that I spoke to was a woman.

It is a sad fact that compared to other fields in medicine dentistry is still predominantly a male profession. There are exceptions, of course, such as Dr Catrise Austin, a New York-based dentist, who I recently met to talk about her decision to offer free HIV tests to her patients. Or Dr Bo Chen from Beijing, who I met at the P-I Brånemark symposium in Sweden where she presented a revealing study on patient satisfaction figures with facial and orofacial reconstruction. Unfortunately, though large in impact, these developments and ideas do not usually receive the recognition they deserve.

However, what these examples also demonstrate is that women often tend to develop solutions that are socially applicable and that offer benefits for all members of society; a fact endorsed by a recent World Health Organisation report. In the study on Women and Health, the question was also raised why women generally have to carry much of the health care burden while getting hardly anything back. It may be time for women, especially those working in medical and dental professions, to step up and make their message heard.

It may not happen overnight, but with more and more women overtaking high political and economical positions, it will be difficult for dentistry to hold up to its Boys Club status for much longer. I certainly hope that when I return to New York in 2010, there will be a larger share of female dentists to speak to.

P-I Branemark’s call to let the patient decide at the Gothenburg Symposium last week must be acknowledged but it goes out to the wrong group of people (see also Experts discuss future of implantology in Gothenburg). More and more patients want aesthetic teeth and they do not care about what it takes to get there. Latest studies also reveal that by now many consider aesthetics to be more important than function. It is up to the dentists to decide whether a tooth should be replaced or not but constantly improving treatment options and lowering investments will make the choice an easy one. On top of that, a growing number of implant vendors is practicing more and more aggressive marketing. It seems unlikely that many dentists will resist these market calls in the long-run.

In Gothenburg, a clinical scan was shown where basically all teeth had been replaced with implants. As ridiculous as this example may be, it does hold some truth. The future doesn’t look very bright for the ‘root’.

My friend’s example, though trivial in nature, is a good example by which to demonstrate the way the oral cavity functions as a window to our inside world. The latest research has shown that it can be a very reliable indicator of our inner state of health. Every day, the salivary glands secretes over 1.5 litres of saliva into the oral cavity, carrying with it valuable information. These biomarkers can be from sites of disease, or the salivary glands themselves can produce surrogate biomarkers of disease. The good news is that the information provided by these can be obtained non-invasively, painlessly and with no embarrassment to the patient—without needles or cringing.

Owing to these salivary properties, a dental examination today is no longer only about teeth and gums. Dentists should be aware that they are probably the first to detect signs of systematic diseases in their patients. Take HIV/Aids for example: despite new, effective medication, the latest infection rates still demonstrate a continued increase in poor and developing countries alike. According to a recent report by UNAIDS, for example, an estimated 50 million women in Asia alone are at risk of becoming infected with HIV/Aids by their intimate partners in the next decade. Early detection could significantly reduce morbidity here.

Oral fluid testing technologies are under development and already in use in several dental offices in Europe and the US. It will be years, perhaps even decades, before these tests are a regular part of every visit to the dentist, but there is no doubt that they will play a valuable part in the management and control of worldwide epidemics, such as HIV/Aids or cancer.

According to news reports, the possible cause of his death was incorrect administering or use of medications such as with Propofol, a strong anaesthesia used in medical contexts such as intensive care units or surgeries. If a doctor facilitated such a medication for Jackson and it is found to have caused his death, he or she could be prosecuted for manslaughter.

Whatever the outcome of the ongoing investigation may be, this is a clear example of increasing unethical health care practices in the United States. Jackson, who despite being in severe debt, was still wealthy enough to afford any medical service, surgery or medications he desired. Over 50 million Americans still do not have access to health insurance. Therefore, the world should mourn the 800,000 people that die of cardiovascular disease every year in the US; deaths which could often be prevented by the provision of adequate health care such as heart screenings and other preventative measures.

Fortunately, recent signs from the White House indicate that President Obama is taking health care reform seriously and this time there is actually a chance that it could be done (see also Americans support dental coverage in health care reforms). However, what the US system needs more than money is an ethical discussion that leads to only one conclusion—to treat health care not as a market commodity but as a public benefit institution.

Unfortunately, another disturbing issue is still with us. Although the media frenzy about the swine flu outbreak has died down, the world is still far from having overcome the crisis. Over the last two months, the virus has found its way from North America through Europe to Asia. There, the World Health Organization has warned, it could combine with avian flu and mutate into a more virulent form, sparking an influenza pandemic that could be expected to circle the globe up to three times. Infection control has never been more important!