CATEGORY 58 AUSTRALASIAN DENTIST CLINICAL The benefits of a general dentist learning orthodontics. What are easy cases for the gp to manage? What cases should the GP avoid? Dr Geoff Hall By Dr Geoff Hall, BDsc (Melb) Cert Orth (Uni of Penn) MRACDS (Orth), Diplomate – American Board of Orthodontics (ABO) Malocclusion is the second most common dental disease after dental caries in children and young adults. Orthodontic care performed after the professional evaluation or patient selfawareness results in beneficial effects, including aesthetic enhancement, functional improvement, and psychosocial well-being. General public should be aware about cause, consequences and the benefits of orthodontic treatment. This can be accomplished by a multidisciplinary approach in which general dental practitioners and other non-orthodontic specialists can play the role of orthodontic health educators. Possible differences in educational training, perception of orthodontic treatment need may differ by dentist group or speciality affiliation. Patient might present with a complain that they cannot correlate with the underlying malocclusion, in such case, it is essential for a dentist to identify and diagnose the orthodontic cause and advice for a referral. A study conducted in 2019, compared the knowledge among general dentists and non- orthodontic specialists with regards to Orthodontic counselling of patients as follows: specialists in relation to the orthodontic treatment is shown in the table above. Orthodontic treatment provided by general dentists has been reported in the literature, but the results are conflicting. A study by Koroluk et al (1988), showed that a large percentage of paediatric and general dentistry practitioners provided comprehensive orthodontic treatment (62% and 17.9%, respectively). Gorczyca et al (JCO 1989) and Jacobs et al (AJODO 1991) found that the number of orthodontic procedures provided increased with the number of hours of orthodontic continuing education attended. Wolsky et al (AJODO 1996) stated that 76.3% of general practitioners were found to provide basic orthodontic treatment and 19.3% provided comprehensive orthodontic treatment. General practitioners who showed a profile of high-volume orthodontic services were found to treat more difficult cases and there was a projected increase in the amount of orthodontic treatment performed in general practice. On the contrary Hilgers et al (AJODO 2003), found that paediatric dentists spent less than 10% of their time providing orthodontic treatment and Galbreath et al (AJODO 2006), noted that general dentists spent less than 10% of their time providing orthodontic treatment. Aldrees et al (2015), conducted a study, which aimed to evaluate the orthodontic diagnostic skills, referral models and orthodontic benefit perceptions of paediatric and GDPs (general dental practitioners) in comparison with orthodontists. It was seen that 62.20% of orthodontists preferred permanent dentition to apply orthodontic treatment, while paediatricians preferred primary and early mixed dentition. Only 38.8% of paediatric dentists and 7.1% of GDPs applied orthodontic treatment clinically, and the treated malocclusions were often intended to correct crossbite, habitbreaking, minor tooth malocclusion, and that practitioners frequently used Hawley appliance and maxillary expansion. Kapoor et al (2018), showed that the understanding and knowledge among general dentist and specialists of the principles of orthodontic diagnosis and timely treatments other than orthodontists was moderate and unsatisfactory. Batarse et al (AJODO 2019), concluded that general dentist applied more fixed and clear aligner treatments than paediatric dentists, evaluated case complexity similarly, and it has been observed that pediatric dentists refer more patients to orthodontists than general dentists. Kayalar et al (2023), in their study evaluated the perceptions and behaviours % of response from general dentists and nonorthodontic specialists The knowledge assessment among general dentists and non-orthodontic
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