Preoperative dental screening prior to cardiac valve surgery and 90-day postoperative mortality.

BACKGROUND: Preoperative dental screening before cardiac valve surgery is widely accepted but its required scope remains unclear. This study evaluates two preoperative dental screening (PDS) approaches, a focused approach (FocA) and a comprehensive approach (CompA), to compare postsurgical 90-day mortality. METHODS: Retrospective cohort analysis was performed on all patients who underwent valve surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital with FocA and Massachusetts General Hospital with CompA of PDS approach from January 2009 to December 2016. Patients with intravenous drug abuse and systemic infections were excluded. Univariate, multivariable, and subgroup analysis was performed. RESULTS: A total of 1835 patients were included in the study. With FocA 96% of patients (1097/1143) received dental clearance in a single encounter with 3.3% receiving radiographs and undergoing dental extractions. With CompA 35.5% of patients (245/692) received dental clearance in a single encounter, 94.2% received radiographs, and 21.8% underwent dental extractions. There was no significant difference in 90-day mortality when comparing both PDS approach (10% vs 8.4%, P = .257). This remained unchanged in a multivariable model after adjusting for risk factors (odds ratio:1.32 [95%CI:0.91-1.93] [P = .14]). Reoperation due to infection was less in FocA (0.5%) vs CompA (2.6) (P < .001) and postoperative septicemia was increased in the FocA (1.7%) cohort when compared to the CompA (0.7%) (P < .001) patients. CONCLUSIONS: There was no difference in post valve surgery 90-day mortality between patients who underwent a FocA vs CompA of PDS.

Medicinal management of oral submucous fibrosis in the past decade- A systematic review.

INTRODUCTION: Oral submucous fibrosis (OSMF) is a potentially malignant disorder with a high rate of malignant transformation. It is associated with chewing of areca nut and tobacco products with a high global prevalence, particularly in the southeast Asian countries. A wide range of treatment modalities are available, ranging from corticosteroids, antioxidants, nutritional supplements to herbal medicines but lacks a reliable treatment regimen. AIM: This systematic review will comprehensively analyze the medicinal treatment for OSMF from 2011 to 2020, apprise the literature with new clinical studies, and initiate a discussion about other potential medicines. MATERIAL AND METHODS: A comprehensive electronic search was conducted in Pubmed, Scopus, and other databases from January 2011 to June 2020 according to the PRISMA guidelines, to identify all the clinical studies for the medicinal management of OSMF with definite keywords and defined criteria. RESULTS: Among the thirty-two included clinical studies 23 were randomized controlled studies and 9 were case-control studies. The treatment outcomes were diverse, and the majority of the studies showed improvement in the subjective signs and symptoms of OSMF. Only a few studies noticed the side effects. CONCLUSION: No single treatment modality is effective in the management of OSMF. The concurrent use of triple therapy is efficacious. The naturally occurring herbal medicines have an immense potential in the management of OSMF. Therefore, high-quality, longitudinal, multi-center randomized controlled trials with larger samples need to be conducted to further assess the efficacy of various medicinal formulations in conjunction with physiotherapy in the management of OSMF.

Oral submucous fibrosis in children and adolescents: Analysis of 36 cases.

Oral submucous fibrosis (OSMF) is a chronic debilitating irreversible oral potentially malignant disorder affecting any part of the oral cavity. It is usually seen in adults but rarely noticed in children and adolescents. Since the paucity of the cases, there exists a gap of knowledge in the causative habits, root reasons of habit initiation, age of habit initiation, and the common clinical representation of this disorder. The current article aims to bridge this gap by presenting unusual 36 cases of children and adolescents reported at the tertiary care hospital of Vadodara, Gujarat, India, with specific areca nut chewing habit and distinct features of OSMF. Furthermore, the present case series is the first of its kind in the scientific literature with a high number of OSMF cases in children and adolescents.

Causal inference and directed acyclic graph: An epidemiological concept much needed for oral submucous fibrosis.

Oral submucous fibrosis (OSMF), although already established as an oral potentially malignant disorder (OPMD), still stands over a weak bridge because of its controversial pathogenesis. There has been tremendous work on this disease since 1962, surprisingly, we are unsuccessful in finding the exact causation of OSMF. The potential cause for this is either a lack of systematically performed clinical observational studies or over-interpreted inferences of the presented results. Accordingly, the literature is piled with complex data that is being followed by emerging researchers. Hence, this conceptual paper is presented to focus and explain only the epidemiological concepts of causal inference and the construction of DAGs. These concepts will help to encode our subject matter knowledge and assumptions regarding the causal structure problem, classify the source of systematic bias, identify the potential confounders, potential issues in the study design, and guide the data analysis.

Oral submucous fibrosis: a contemporary narrative review with a proposed inter-professional approach for an early diagnosis and clinical management.

Oral Submucous fibrosis (OSMF) has traditionally been described as "a chronic, insidious, scarring disease of the oral cavity, often with involvement of the pharynx and the upper esophagus". Millions of individuals are affected, especially in South and South East Asian countries. The main risk factor is areca nut chewing. Due to its high morbidity and high malignant transformation rate, constant efforts have been made to develop effective management. Despite this, there have been no significant improvements in prognosis for decades. This expert opinion paper updates the literature and provides a critique of diagnostic and therapeutic pitfalls common in developing countries and of deficiencies in management. An inter-professional model is proposed to avoid these pitfalls and to reduce these deficiencies.

Proposed clinical definition for oral submucous fibrosis.

Oral Submucous Fibrosis (OSMF) is an insidious, chronic, complex, crippling, debilitating, irreversible, progressive, scarring, potentially malignant and collagen metabolic disorder, induced by a known carcinogen areca nut; wherein the oral mucosa, and occasionally the pharynx and esophagus is subjected to various pathological changes with significant clinical manifestations at different stages of progression, leading to functional morbidity; and with a risk of malignant transformation in the overlying epithelium. Although the condition is mainly diagnosed based on classic clinical manifestations, the commonly used existing definition for oral submucous fibrosis is primarily based on histological features. The authors have conducted extensive clinical research studies on OSMF and intends to propose a new clinical definition as 'a debilitating, progressive, irreversible collagen metabolic disorder induced by chronic chewing of areca nut and its commercial preparations; affecting the oral mucosa and occasionally the pharynx and esophagus; leading to mucosal stiffness and functional morbidity; and has a potential risk of malignant transformation.' Thus, a new clinical definition is put forward so as to assist the academicians, researchers and clinicians in terming and grouping this disease according to its clinical and biological behaviour for its subsequent management.