Monthly Archives: March 2015
Oral cancer: Come together, right now
Somewhere along the way, something really bizarre happened: The mouth got separated from the rest of the body. After all, we have dentists, and we have physicians. We have dental insurance and we have medical insurance.
The result is the adoption of a notion that what happens in the mouth doesn’t really matter—that they’re just teeth after all … I can always get a denture. But as dental professionals, we understand that it’s not just about teeth. The mouth as part of the gastrointestinal system is home to all kinds of microbes—some helpful and others that are down-right destructive. The challenge is to help our medical colleagues and the patient understand the impact that oral health has on systemic health. [Read more…]
The top 5 reasons to really think about oral cancer
April is Oral and Head and Neck Cancer Awareness Month, a time to pause to consider the ravages of this disease and rededicate our efforts as oral health care providers to do our part to find oral and oropharyngeal cancers at an early stage.
Hopefully, by now, each of us is well aware of the importance of our role to search for signs of oral and head and neck cancer in each of our patients and how we can make a significant impact in the staggering statistics associated with this disease: One American dies each hour of every day from oral cancer. [Read more…]
Delco firm seeks to detect cancer in spit
Spit is central to Stephen Swanick’s vision for detecting disease.
His product, SaliMark OSCC, which debuted this month, uses genetic material in saliva to judge the risk of whether an oral lesion is cancerous.
Swanick, 51, left his job in the medical-device industry and spent $1.3 million of his own money to pursue this. He founded PeriRx in Broomall in 2008, hoping spit would help spot a spectrum of illnesses, from lung cancer to diabetes. [Read more…]
How Dentists Are Poised to Unlock the Potential of Molecular Salivary Testing
Scientific Background
Saliva has been shown to have a rich biomarker alphabet which includes DNA, RNA, proteins, metabolites and microbes. The mechanisms by which the salivary gland alters it secretion in the presence of disease in a topic of ongoing investigation, but some elements such as transcription factors and exosomes have been identified.
The National Institutes of Health and the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research have heavily supported the development of the science of salivary diagnostics for more than a decade. The messenger RNAs or transcriptome reflect gene expression which has been demonstrated in animal models of melanoma and lung cancer to change in response to systemic disease. [Read more…]
Oral cancer v.2.015
There is a movement that is quietly taking place in health care. Like any movement that ultimately gives rise to change, the shift is subtle and still unnoticed by many. But as dental professionals pause next month to draw attention to the horrors of oral, head, and neck cancer (OHNC), it is important to realize how this trend is affecting and will continue to affect the way we search for and manage this disease. The revolutionary concept is known as personalized or individualized health care. [Read more…]