Article
Olympian – person of great attainment 1
Four years ago, with the London Games upcoming, I wrote, in a Dental Olympians Comment, about the rise of zirconia as a base material for crowns and bridges. Whether this has continued to make inroads into the metal ceramic market is uncertain. I also wrote about the possibility of the dental implant becoming a mainstream part of everyday dental practice. Recent evidence on the exponential rise in peri-implantitis and peri-implant mucositis (published recently in Dental Update2) had led me to question my glowing report on implants four years ago, along with others, such as the great Jan Lindhe.3 My predictions were therefore somewhat wide of the mark, but it is always difficult to predict the future (as exemplified by the fact that I am writing this Comment on the day when Leicester City amazed and pleased the world by winning the Premier League title at odds of 5,000 to 1!). Therefore, while I did not name any Olympians four years ago, I will do this time. So, who are the dental Olympians of the past four years, as per the definition above?
Dr Kevin Lewis has served the UK dental community regally for over twenty years, given his role in writing monthly commentaries on the political side of the profession, alerting us to the wrongdoings of our regulator, generally written with a fiendish humour which has made us all smile. However, it was in his role as Dental Director of Dental Protection that I was able to watch him in action in his ‘day job’, always dealing with those who had come unstuck with fairness and compassion and always giving us the benefit of wisdom accrued from a career in dental practice before medicolegal matters took priority in his career. He has been a true Olympian and I am sure that, despite giving up the ‘day job’, he will continue to keep a watchful eye on UK dentistry.
Professor Jimmy Steele is another Olympian who has striven to organize a new Contract for the general dentists of England and Wales. Having chaired the report which is synonymous with his name and which pointed out the many shortcomings of the UDA system, he has worked tirelessly on the profession's behalf to try to achieve not only a fairer system, but one which places prevention at the forefront of all that we do (and might eventually get paid for). The dental profession in England and Wales owe him great debt of gratitude for his tireless work as a true Olympian: I, the Editorial Board and readers of Dental Update send him our best wishes.
Professors Iain Chapple and Philip Preshaw have produced robust evidence of the perio-systemic links which have really put periodontology in the forefront of, not only oral health, but also general health. As a result of their work and that of other researchers, there is now good evidence indicating that the risk of having heart disease is increased by having gum disease, and that hyperglycaemia predisposes to periodontitis.4 To the extent that, if we see a patient with multiple sites of suppuration, (s)he should be referred for diabetes screening. In short, diabetes predisposes to periodontal disease and periodontal disease predisposes to diabetes. Other work has given no evidence of an association between periodontal disease and adverse pregnancy outcomes, something which had previously been suspected. These superb researchers have blown away the myth that periodontology is mere ‘gum gardening’ and shown the potential impact on health that is just beginning to be realized: true Dental Olympians in the field of dental research.
Other Olympians of the past four years (indeed the past ten years!) are the NHS dental practitioners of England and Wales who have continued to have to work within a grossly unsuitable system, but to which they have adapted to some degree. Not to cast doubt on their work, my principal anxiety, having just seen a patient whose treatment bordered on cynical disregard for the patient's wellbeing, is that the system continues to provide little or no check on the quality of the treatments which are provided. That taxpayers are not aware of this is a continuing scandal. There are, without doubt, other dental Olympians who have not been mentioned, – readers please send me your suggestions for publication in a future letters page. One thing remains as the Olympic years roll by, that Dental Update has continued to update its readership by way of reviews of current thinking on subjects of relevance to clinicians which, in turn, will benefit their patients.
This issue sees the final parts of two superb long-running series, on Endodontics and on Pain. While these series were very different, I hope that they have been enjoyed by the readers of Dental Update, and that this has been translated into improving care for our patients. Thanks are due to all the authors concerned: their efforts on behalf of Dental Update are much appreciated.