ABSTRACT
Background: The health and life of a healthcare worker are repeatedly under threat due to the rising number of epidemics and pandemics. The COVID?19 pandemic is said to be fatal in people with a risky biological, demographic profile and working environment. This study is the first of its kind carried out on the dentist population from India, who were most affected during the COVID?19 pandemic. Aims and Objective: The present study aims to assess the biological risk of dentists based on the objective risk stratification (ORS) tool developed by Strain et al. Materials and Methods: This was a cross?sectional study of dentists in government dental colleges of Kerala using the online form of the ORS tool consisting of questions which included certain demographic characteristics and comorbid conditions of the individual. An additional question was added to the tool, to categorise the work of the dentist depending on the exposure to aerosol (non?aerosol, minimal aerosol and aerosol). Results: Out of the 74 dentists, 48.6% reported high aerosol and 31% with minimal aerosol. The median score of the study participants was 2 (ranging from 1 to 12). Using the ORS tool, 16.2% had medium risk and only 2.7% had high risk. When the ORS tool was stratified with the aerosol generation, 5.4% had minimal and 6.7% had significant with medium?risk scores. Also, 2.7% with a high?risk score had minimal aerosol generation. Conclusion: Identifying the high?risk category to allocate duties accordingly and decrease the morbidity and mortality among dentists has to be kept a top priority in the event of a pandemic.
ABSTRACT
Introduction: Vegetable granuloma or pulse granulomaresults from the implantation of food particles of plant orvegetable origin and is usually seen in periapical or in sulcusareas. Many authors have postulated that food particleswhich are getting implanted will rapidly get digested, or maysometimes partly get altered by host responses resulting invegetable granuloma or pulse granuloma. The cellulose partof plant food being indigestible may persists in the form ofhyaline material, whereas the starch matter gets digested. Thiscellulose moiety invokes chronic granulomatous response.Case report: 30-year-old female patient was referred from aprivate hospital for a swelling in relation to right side of cheekwhich they had noticed accidently on a radiograph which hadtaken during extraction of her tooth. Intraoral examinationwas negative for swelling, and on palpation a bony hardswelling of size 0.5cm ×0.5cm in relation to anterior border oframus can be located.Radiograph showed a mixed radiopaqueradiolucent lesion with predominant radiopacity of 1cm×1cmnear to external oblique ridge.Histopathology showed thepresence of concentric lamellated amorphous eosinophilicstructure surrounded by fibro cellular connective tissuecapsule.Conclusion: A pulse granuloma is nothing but a reaction ofthe foreign body to any vegetable which is characterized by acollection of the hyaline; pulse granuloma is a well describedentity with distinct histopathology. Occurrence of pulsegranuloma can be well documented if extensive sampling isdone.