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Worldental Daily New Delhi, 13 September 2014

News Saturday & Sunday, 13–14 September 2014 F DI has just opened its ‘data hub for global oral health’, an evolv- ingonlinedatabaseoforalhealth statisticsandindicators.Ithasstarted out with a limited amount of informa- tion but it is anticipated that the con- tent will expand and deepen in the coming months. The ‘hub’ has been developed under the guidance of the FDI Oral Health Atlas Task Team, and aims ultimately to provide a one-stop shop for all information pertaining directly or indirectly to global oral health. Evidence-baseddecision-makingis a key issue in the international health- care community: it promotes good sci- ence, encourages transparency and professional accountability, and helps focus efforts and monitor progress. Databringefficiencyandeffectiveness to the strategic decision-making process. In the field of healthcare, data are especiallyimportant,wherereliablein- formation is crucial for the effective al- location of scarce resources. This is why it is vital to remedy the dearth of data in the field of oral health/disease and oral care. FDI’s Oral Health Atlas has proved to be a landmark achieve- mentsinceitwaspublishedin2009,fill- ingavoid;nevertheless,withdatadat- ing back, in some cases, to the 1990s, andonlyalimitednumberofindicators available,itsinformationisnowinneed ofanupdate. From the perspective of health pol- icy,thelackoforalhealthdatahasham- pered the World Health Organization’s (WHO) efforts to develop, for oral health, a comprehensive global moni- toring framework including a set of in- dicators to monitor trends and to as- sessprogressintheimplementationof healthcarestrategiesandplans. FDIanditspartnersworkedhardto ensurethatthe2011UNPoliticalDecla- rationonthePreventionandControlof Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs), from whichWHO’s action plans derive, recognizes that oral diseases pose a major health burden for many coun- tries, share common risk factors with themainNCDs,andcangreatlybenefit from common responses to NCDs.The challenge is to quantify that burden so that, as of now, year on year progress canbemadeandmeasured. Thus,itisanticipatedthatthe‘data hub for global oral health’ created by FDI,theleadinginternationalorganiza- tion in the field of oral healthcare, and availabletoitsmembernationaldental associations and a wider public, will alsohelptoprovideasoundbasisfora future global oral health monitoring framework. As for content, the ‘data hub’ will cast the net much wider for informa- tion.Forexample,thecrucialroleofso- cial determinants in oral health will make socio-economic data a key com- ponent.Sowillthedataonincidenceof NCDs such as diabetes where a close relationshipwithoraldiseasehasbeen clearlyestablished. Theoriginalityofthehubisnotinthe content,which,forthemomentatleast, derives from a number of publicly- available sources; rather, it is in the ‘packaging’,centralizingthewidearray of data and indicators from around the world. Contrary to traditional data- bases, the evolving FDI database aims at pointing out that more effort should bemadetowardsfillingthegapsinoral healthdataworldwide. Assuch,the‘hub’willbeapowerful advocacyresourceforthehugeefforts thaturgentlyneedtobeundertaken,a uniquesourceofdatacollectionandan essential tool for all those who are in- terested in improving the state of oral healthintheworld. A new focus on oral health data and indicators FDIopensonlinehubforglobaloraldata.ByProfLi-JianJin,Chair,FDIOralHealthAtlasTaskTeam. 6 www.fdiworldental.org AD

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