Evaluation of an oral health programme targeting prison inmates in Saudi Arabia.

This paper aimed to evaluate the impact of an oral health programme targeting prisoners in eastern Saudi Arabia. The reach, effectiveness, adoption, implementation and maintenance (RE-AIM) strategy was used as the evaluation framework to assess both process and outcome. This annual programme included four stations: an interview, an educational session, dental examination and treatment. Programme indicators included the number of prisoners reached, percent improvement in oral health practices, teeth present in the mouth and percent reduction in dental treatment needs. A non-experimental pre- and post-programme evaluation design was implemented. Prisons in eastern Saudi Arabia were visited once a year from 2016 to 2019. The evaluation used primary data collected during the visits in the form of clinical examination and surveys. The number of beneficiaries increased from 270 to 634, and three cities within the Eastern province were covered. The percent of inmates who smoke and consume sugary drinks decreased by 24 and 30%, respectively; however, there was a 25% reduction in regular toothbrushing using a fluoridated toothpaste. The long-term outcomes showed an improvement in the overall oral health condition and treatment needs: periodontal treatment needs and surgical procedures were reduced by 91 and 79%, respectively. The programme was successful based on the RE-AIM framework. This is the first sustainable oral health programme targeting prison inmates in the Middle East. The findings indicate that the oral health programme had positive effects on prisoners' oral health and achieved its objectives. Such programmes can help address health disparities among populations.

The Effect of Sealer Application Methods on Voids Volume after Aging of Three Calcium Silicate-Based Sealers: A Micro-Computed Tomography Study.

During obturation, air voids are undesirable as they may provide shelter for microorganisms or passage for fluids. This study aimed to compare the occurrence of voids between three calcium silicate-based sealers (CSBSs) (MTA-Fillapex, BioRoot-RCS, Bio-C) and the change in their volume after aging. In addition, we aimed to compare voids when using two sealer application methods: lentulo-spiral (LS) and gutta-percha (GP) cone. Thirty extracted mandibular premolars (n = 30) were endodontically prepared and obturated using single GP cone (SGPC) technique. Each sealer was applied to 10 teeth (n = 10) using LS or GP. Micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) was used to quantify the volume of root filling and voids before and after 8-week storage in a phosphate-rich medium. The percentage of root filling and voids were compared between the groups using a Mann-Whitney U test and Kruskal-Wallis test with a Bonferroni correction. Before aging, the percentages of root filling volume after obturation were comparable with no significant differences between sealers (p = 0.325) or application methods (p = 0.950). After aging, the voids' volume increased significantly in all sealers (p ≤ 0.05). However, no significant differences were found between sealers (p = 0.302). In conclusion, voids in CSBSs may not reduce in size with aging; hence, SGPC should be carefully selected for suitable cases.

Forecasting the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic in Saudi Arabia using ARIMA prediction model under current public health interventions.

The substantial increase in the number of daily new cases infected with coronavirus around the world is alarming, and several researchers are currently using various mathematical and machine learning-based prediction models to estimate the future trend of this pandemic. In this work, we employed the Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) model to forecast the expected daily number of COVID-19 cases in Saudi Arabia in the next four weeks. We first performed four different prediction models; Autoregressive Model, Moving Average, a combination of both (ARMA), and integrated ARMA (ARIMA), to determine the best model fit, and we found out that the ARIMA model outperformed the other models. The forecasting results showed that the trend in Saudi Arabia will continue growing and may reach up to 7668 new cases per day and over 127,129 cumulative daily cases in a matter of four weeks if stringent precautionary and control measures are not implemented to limit the spread of COVID-19. This indicates that the Umrah and Hajj Pilgrimages to the two holy cities of Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia that are supposedly scheduled to be performed by nearly 2 million Muslims in mid-July may be suspended. A set of extreme preventive and control measures are proposed in an effort to avoid such a situation.