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Spencer's avatar

Dentistry is the used car dealership of medical services.

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Jaime Borjas-Howard's avatar

Great episode! On dentistry there does seem to be a field (periodontology) generating more promising, *randomised* evidence that treating periodontitis modulates important important cardiovascular risk factors such as Hba1c in diabetics and blood pressure in people with established hypertension.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/landia/article/PIIS2213-8587(18)30038-X/abstract

https://academic.oup.com/eurheartj/article/40/42/3459/5556904

the tricky thing is that these effects are seen in the people with established disease, which mean we have to be a bit careful whether periodontitis is a mediator/effect modifier or itself a driver of cardiovascular disease. Therefore, we can make the leap of faith to say that dentristy services would be good for public health.

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Jaime Borjas-Howard's avatar

Should have said can’T make the leap of faith ;)

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Colby Robertson's avatar

I found the mocking of RFK Jr's spasmodic dysphonia here a bit jarring, which rather took away from what was otherwise a great episode. There's no shortage of things to criticise him for, and for which he's actually responsible.

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Tom Chivers's avatar

Hi Colby. That's a fair point, to be honest, and I now feel a bit bad. Thanks for pointing it out.

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Colby Robertson's avatar

No need to feel bad. Thanks for the speedy reply, and keep up the good work.

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