Partnerships key to successful dental/oral health research
We conduct clinical research in real-world dental care-delivery settings and spread and implement our research learnings broadly to improve oral health.
Areas of expertise include:
- Temporomandibular disorders
- Orofacial pain
- Clinical decision support
- Data mining (identify patterns and relationships of large data sets)
- Periodontal disease
- Simulated clinical training
- Oral and systemic health
- Dental provider-initiated tobacco interventions
- Dental workforce models
- Practice-based research in community-based dental settings
We have established relationships with leading clinical and academic oral health research groups nationwide and are a member of the Health Care Systems Research Network (HCSRN). One of HCSRN’s main efforts is the support of a common database structure (the Virtual Data Warehouse) to allow cross-member common research.
We are a leader among HCSRN members with dental providers who can share medical and dental research data. This makes it one of the few oral health data sets with more than 12 years of linked medical and oral health research data.
We are the administrative center of the Midwest Region of the National Dental Practice-Based Research Network, which is funded by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. The network is a consortium of practices and dental organizations committed to advancing knowledge of dental practice and finding ways to improve it. Essentially, it is practical science for the benefit of real-world, everyday clinical practice.
Investigators
Key projects
Dental Decision Simulation (DDSim)
This project developed an Internet case-based tool. The tool simulates clinical assessments in case presentation format. It includes information such as hard and soft tissue findings, radiographs, health and dental histories and diagnosis and treatment plans. The tool gives the clinician feedback on how well their treatment plan matched current best available evidence.
