Sleep-Disordered Breathing - A Dental Perspective.

What is Sleep Disordered Breathing? What are the causes of Sleep Disordered Breathing? What role does an Orthodontist play? The article aims at answering such questions and spreading the ideology and seriousness of this disorder. Normal sleep involves air passing through and going directly down to the lungs. With an obstructed airway, the structures in the back of the throat occlude the airway due to an inadequate motor tone of the tongue and airway dilator muscles, and thus, prevent the air from passing.

Evaluation of injectable platelet-rich fibrin effect on the rate of canine retraction and alkaline phosphatase levels: An in-vivo study.

INTRODUCTION: With time, the treatment protocol has changed, and currently, there is a new school of treatment called accelerated orthodontics, wherein the goal is to shorten the time. In this study, a liquid formulation of platelet-rich fibrin such as injectable platelet-rich fibrin (i-PRF), was used, and its effect on the rate of canine retraction and the crevicular alkaline phosphatase (ALP) levels were studied. METHODS: Thirteen patients were recruited for this study with a mean age of 20.6 ± 3.2 years. A split-mouth type of study design was used in which the maxillary arch of each subject was divided into an experimental and control group. I-PRF was injected in the labial and lingual attached gingiva of the canine in the experimental group. The gingival crevicular fluid collection was done from the distal aspect of the canine before canine retraction, 24 hours after retraction, and 28 days after retraction from both sites (ie, control and experimental sites). ALP activity was analyzed using a semiautomated analyzer, and the rate of canine retraction was measured on stone casts with the help of a digital vernier caliper. RESULTS: The individual canine retraction was 1.8-fold faster in the i-PRF group than in the control group. The ALP activity was significantly greater at 24 hrs and 28 days after retraction in the experimental group. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest that i-PRF is an innovative, noninvasive approach to accelerating tooth movement. ALP activity in gingival crevicular fluid reflects the biological changes in the periodontium, and the steep increase in the activity indicates increased bone remodeling within the experimental group.

An Assessment of Teaching and Learning Practices: A Questionnaire Study for Dental Educators of Karnataka.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: Faculty members of dental institutions are being asked to assume new academic duties for which they have received no formal training. To succeed in new teaching tasks, faculty development through assessment of teaching skills is essential. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A Self-Assessment Questionnaire consisting 18 closed-ended questions was sent to various faculty members of dental colleges of Karnataka. A total of 210 faculty members volunteered to participate in the study. The response rate was 69.8%. Data gathered were statistically analyzed using SPSS software version 16, Chi-square test, and descriptive statistics. RESULTS: In the present study, 27.3% of participants were unaware of andragogy, 33.3% were unaware of teachers development programs, 44.6% do not obtain student feedback after teaching, 52.6% were unaware of peer review of teaching skills, and 50% were unaware of interprofessional education initiatives. CONCLUSION: By incorporating teaching and learning skills, dental faculty could acquire competencies and academic credentials to become valuable contributors to the institution. This study emphasizes the areas of improvement in dental school learning environment, based on activation of prior knowledge, elaboration of new learning, learning in context, transfer of learning, and organization of knowledge toward learning.

Evaluation of oral stereognostic ability after rehabilitating patients with complete dentures: in vivo study.

Stereognosis has been defined as the appreciation of the form of objects by palpation. Whilst this definition holds good for the manual exploration of objects, it is possible for the shape of objects to be explored intra orally referred to as oral stereognosis. To better understand patients' relative satisfaction with complete dentures, differences in oral stereognostic perception, based on the identification of 6 edible objects was analyzed in a group of 30 edentulous individuals at 3 stages, namely, just before (pre-treatment), 30 min after (30 min post-treatment) and 1 month after (1 month post-treatment) the insertion of new dentures. The time required to identify each object was recorded and the correctness of identification of each object was scored using oral stereognostic score. Descriptive statistics, Wilcoxon signed rank test, Spearman's rank correlation test, Pearson Chi square test was used to statistically analyze the data obtained. OSA scores was significantly increased 1 month post-treatment compared to 30 min post-treatment (p < 0.05). It was found that Oral stereognostic test is reliable for measuring patients' oral stereognostic perception and may be used as one of the clinical aids in appreciating the functional limitations imposed by the prostheses.

Motion correction of PET brain images through deconvolution: II. Practical implementation and algorithm optimization.

Image quality is significantly degraded even by small amounts of patient motion in very high-resolution PET scanners. When patient motion is known, deconvolution methods can be used to correct the reconstructed image and reduce motion blur. This paper describes the implementation and optimization of an iterative deconvolution method that uses an ordered subset approach to make it practical and clinically viable. We performed ten separate FDG PET scans using the Hoffman brain phantom and simultaneously measured its motion using the Polaris Vicra tracking system (Northern Digital Inc., Ontario, Canada). The feasibility and effectiveness of the technique was studied by performing scans with different motion and deconvolution parameters. Deconvolution resulted in visually better images and significant improvement as quantified by the Universal Quality Index (UQI) and contrast measures. Finally, the technique was applied to human studies to demonstrate marked improvement. Thus, the deconvolution technique presented here appears promising as a valid alternative to existing motion correction methods for PET. It has the potential for deblurring an image from any modality if the causative motion is known and its effect can be represented in a system matrix.

Motion correction of PET brain images through deconvolution: I. Theoretical development and analysis in software simulations.

Image quality is significantly degraded even by small amounts of patient motion in very high-resolution PET scanners. Existing correction methods that use known patient motion obtained from tracking devices either require multi-frame acquisitions, detailed knowledge of the scanner, or specialized reconstruction algorithms. A deconvolution algorithm has been developed that alleviates these drawbacks by using the reconstructed image to estimate the original non-blurred image using maximum likelihood estimation maximization (MLEM) techniques. A high-resolution digital phantom was created by shape-based interpolation of the digital Hoffman brain phantom. Three different sets of 20 movements were applied to the phantom. For each frame of the motion, sinograms with attenuation and three levels of noise were simulated and then reconstructed using filtered backprojection. The average of the 20 frames was considered the motion blurred image, which was restored with the deconvolution algorithm. After correction, contrast increased from a mean of 2.0, 1.8 and 1.4 in the motion blurred images, for the three increasing amounts of movement, to a mean of 2.5, 2.4 and 2.2. Mean error was reduced by an average of 55% with motion correction. In conclusion, deconvolution can be used for correction of motion blur when subject motion is known.