Dental Tribune United Kingdom Edition

C onfidence amongst dentists has increased dramatically since the start of the year, according to the latest Lloyds TSB Com- mercial Healthcare Confi- dence Index, with short term optimism rising from minus eight per cent in January, to nine per cent, a positive shift of 17 per cent. This boost to sentiment fol- lows a fall in confidence at the start of the year, possibly on the back of concerns about how NHS contracts would be de- livered in the longer term and the stresses around the CQC. Despite an overall rise in confidence in the last six months, increased financial pressures are set to impact on the dental sector, with more than three quarters (77 per cent) of practitioners saying that they expect to see these concerns increase in the next five years. Jas Matharoo, Director at Nice Teeth Ltd, said: “An in- teresting figure to emerge out of the latest report is that 58 per cent of dentists definitely want to be involved in prem- ises ownership.’’ Commenting on the sur- vey results, Ian Crompton, Head of Healthcare Banking Services at Lloyds TSB Com- mercial, said: “It is encourag- ing to see overall confidence returning to the dentistry sec- tor. There are still concerns about financial pressures and the funding and impact of new NHS contracts, but dentists are perhaps becoming more used to change than other pri- mary care professionals, such as doctors, who remain quite pessimistic. “By adopting a forward looking approach to prac- tice management and an in- creasingly flexible attitude to service provision, dentists are in a better position to adapt to new regulations going forward. “We have a successful history of advising and sup- porting businesses in the healthcare sector, in a range of disciplines. Our team of relationship managers has a strong knowledge and sound understanding of the chal- lenges facing these businesses and we are determined to en- sure that they remain finan- cially fit for the future.” The Healthcare Confi- dence Index was first pub- lished in August 2011 and is now in its third wave. It aims to provide an insight into the attitudes and opinions of pri- mary healthcare providers; GPs, dentists and pharmacists, over the next one to five years. To view the full Lloyds TSB Commercial Healthcare Confidence Index please visit www.lloydstsb.com/health- care and to take part in the next Healthcare Confidence Index visit www.healthcare- confidenceindex.co.uk DT Rise in confidence amongst dentists A new study, published in the Journal of Dental Re- search has found that an intervention designed to teach children to be confident in the face of challenges can have a positive effect on their oral and dental health. In a cluster randomised controlled trial involving 12 schools in Khonkaen, Thai- land, and 261 schoolchildren, children from the schools that participated in an intervention designed to bolster their “sense of coherence” had “the abil- ity to see life as a challenge in which coping skills can be used to deal with stressors”, and showed significantly better oral health-related quality of life compared with children from schools randomly assigned to a control group. The children in the intervention group also ex- hibited improved beliefs about the importance of healthy den- tal behaviours and had better gingival health than those in the control group. “This is a hugely important study in the dental literature. While there is some evidence in dentistry of the benefits of a sense of coherence, much of this work is cross-sectional so we don’t really know if sense of coherence really brought about any possible change,” said study co-author Sarah R. Baker, PhD, a health psychologist at the University of Sheffield in an interview with Medscape Medi- cal News. “Our study is the first intervention study to show that altering sense of coherence can influence oral health,” she said. In the study, 12 different pri- mary schools were randomly assigned to the intervention group or the control group. Fifth graders, aged 10 to 12 years, participated. Students assigned to the intervention group re- ceived seven sessions over two months focused on child par- ticipation and empowerment. Each session lasted 30 to 40 minutes. The first four sessions were classroom-based activi- ties, involving didactic learning, games, and discussions. The last three were health-related school projects that included all students and staff, and involved brainstorming, planning, evalu- ation, and implementation. The intervention was delivered by six teachers who went through specialised, intensive one-day training. Results indicated that com- pared with the control group, the children who received les- sons in sense of coherence had mean scores on the oral health- related quality-of-life ques- tionnaire that indicated fewer functional limitations and other problems due to dental health three months after the intervention. Children in the intervention group also showed a greater sense of coherence than did those in the control group and were more likely to rate healthy dental behaviours as important. It also found that more children in the interven- tion group than in the control group had normal gingival health three months after the intervention. In an accompanying edito- rial, Gary Slade, PhD, from the University of North Carolina, wrote: “One implication [of the study] is that children’s gingival health and oral-health-related quality of life can be improved by a school-based intervention that targets the psychosocial determinants of oral health rather than oral health behav- iours themselves.” DT Confidence in children improves dental health A dissolvable oral strip has been developed to immediately relieve pain from burns caused by ingestion of hot foods and liquids, such as coffee, pizza, and soup. Lead researcher Jason Mc- Conville, PhD, and colleagues from University of Texas at Austin, designed the strip for controlled delivery of a local anesthetic, benzocaine, and a therapeutic polymer. Ben- zocaine, commonly used as a topical pain reliever in dental products and throat lozenges, was chosen for its non-irritat- ing properties. The strip is applied direct- ly to the burned part of the tongue, cheek or roof of the mouth. It sticks to the affected area and won’t interfere with normal day-to-day activities, as it quickly dissolves for in- stant pain relief and promotes healing. “We found these strips to be non-toxic, which has huge potential for anyone who burns their mouth while eat- ing and drinking hot foods- and that’s just about every- one,” said McConville. “The strips look and behave similar to breath freshening strips that you might find at your lo- cal drugstore.” Now based at the Uni- versity of New Mexico, Mc- Conville and his team, will explore creating a stronger oral strip to treat more severe burns lasting longer than two- three days. The next step in furthering their research will be to test the strips in humans and experiment with taste- masking. DT Dissolvable strip offers pain relief for burns M onica Symes, a dentist in Lyme Regis, Dorset, says an NHS infection control worker warned her that keeping back issues of Country Life and Private Eye could make her fail health and safety inspections. According to reports, NHS of- ficials have issued a warning to dentists to stop keeping old mag- azines in their waiting room as they pose a health and safety risk. They believe that the magazines could be responsible for helping to spread bacteria and should be thrown out after a week. Since last April, all dentists have been required to register with the Care Quality Commis- sion (CQC), which can inspect their facilities and check they are maintaining treatment standards. However, surgeries and dental or- ganisations have complained that the bureaucracy has bogged them down in red tape, and done little to improve care of patients. Under the regime, dental practices are required to explain how they are “meeting the nu- tritional needs” of their patients – the same question routinely put to hospitals, which provide meals for patients – as well as respecting their human rights and protecting them from abuse. Each surgery is also required to set out a “state- ment of purpose” about what they want to achieve. Dr John Milne, Chairman of the British Dental Association’s general dental practice commit- tee, said dentists took cleanliness and hygiene very seriously, but suggested it was heavy-handed to wage war on magazines. He said: “Providing magazines in waiting rooms for patients to read is a good way of helping them to relax and can ease the concerns of anxious individuals. “Too often, in recent years, it has felt like regulation has been designed to hinder, rather than support, dentists’ efforts to care for their patients.” A spokesman for Dorset PCT said the current advice to prac- tice owners is that patient wait- ing areas should be kept clear of unnecessary clutter to facilitate regular effective cleaning. He added: “There is no specific re- quirement for practices to remove magazines within a specified time period; however, practice owners, as part of a cleaning schedule, should ensure that mag- azines are in good condition and free from obvious contamination. This advice will be kept under re- view and may be modified in the event of any future community in- fection outbreaks.” DT Old magazines pose health risk in dentist waiting rooms October 29 - November 4, 20124 News United Kingdom Edition