The Diversity Bonus in Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery

The Epidemiology of Dental Pathologies in Elderly Patients Admitted to a Tertiary Level Hospital in Oradea, NW Romania: A 5-Year Retrospective Study

Oral diseases can affect the quality of life of all individuals, including elderly people. In elderly people, the associated general diseases can increase the risk of dental pathologies or can impact their treatment. The main aim of this study was to identify elderly patients with dental pathology out of the total number of patients admitted to the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery at a tertiary-level hospital in North-Western Romania. Another aim was to describe the characteristics of the patients included in this study, as well as to analyze data from patients with dental pathologies. In this retrospective study, the medical records of patients admitted to the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery at the Bihor County Emergency Hospital between 2016 and 2020 were analyzed, with a focus on patients aged 65 years or more. After applying the exclusion criteria, 721 patients were kept in the study, of which 316 (43.8%) had at least one dental pathology. Most elderly patients with dental pathologies were admitted in 2018 (n = 89). The most common associated systemic diseases were arterial hypertension (n = 268) and ischemic heart disease (n = 233), while the most common dental pathologies were pulpitis (n = 185), chronic apical periodontitis (n = 61) and abscesses (n = 35). Most patients were either healed or had an improved condition at the time of discharge. The great number of dental pathologies, as well as the diversity in dental pathologies, underline the necessity for better preventive programs aimed not only at children, adolescents or young people but at the elderly population as well.

Oral and maxillofacial literature from Middle East: a bibliometric analysis and list of top-100 most cited articles

OBJECTIVES

The aim of this work is to perform a bibliometric analysis on Middle Eastern oral and maxillofacial surgery through years and to compare the data with previous studies. A list of the top 100 most cited articles was generated.

METHODS

A Pubmed bibliographic search for literature journals specialized in oral and maxillofacial surgery in the Middle East was performed. A graphic representation of authorship and keywords was created with VOSviewer. Mendeley and Microsoft Excel were used for tabulation and data visualization. A list of the top 100 most cited articles was created using Web of Science. Some statistical tests were performed with a 95% confidence interval, which was considered significant.

RESULTS

A total of 6,536 articles were retrieved in fifteen selected oral and maxillofacial journals. A moderate correlation between number of publications and total population (R = 0.6052), low correlation with area (R = 0.302291), and a negligible correlation with the Human Development Index (HDI) were found (R = 0.1747). A disparity can be seen in the number of publications by country, leaded by Turkey (46.30%), Israel and Iran (13.68% each). The more common studied topic was oral surgery (25.77%), maxillofacial trauma (16.13%) and oral pathology (10.25%).

CONCLUSIONS

A useful list of the top 100 most cited articles on oral and maxillofacial surgery from Middle East has been created. Middle East publications on oral and maxillofacial surgery can be considered high quality (IF = 1.879). Some issues on performing an adequate selecting of MeSH keywords were discussed.

The Effect of Sociodemographic Factors on Obtaining a Place in Core Surgical Training

Competition for Core Surgical Training (CST) is rising, placing a strong emphasis on interview performance. Several interview courses offer to help candidates secure their chosen surgical job but at premium fees. A group of London-based CSTs started a free course offering high-quality mock interview experiences to over 90 applicants in 2022, with the aim of providing an accessible opportunity for financially disadvantaged candidates. Course candidates completed three sets of questionnaires, pre- and post-mock interview, and a final one upon job allocation. Candidates' educational background and schooling history were obtained as well as their self-assessment score, eventual rank after interview and the rank of the job they had accepted. The three sets of questionnaires were completed by 87, 73 and 45 candidates respectively. Overall, there was a statistically significant difference in self-reported confidence scores after the course (P < 0.001). There was no significant difference in the self-assessment score of the 44.2% of candidates who had attended private education in the UK, compared to publicly educated (P = 0.0525), nor was there a difference in their rank after interviews (P = 0.236). Candidates who spent £50 or more had higher self-assessment scores (P = 0.042) but they didn't rank higher in overall scores (P = 0.591). Interview preparation courses are helpful in increasing candidates' confidence, however spending more money does not translate into a better overall interview performance. Our study suggests that candidates from private education backgrounds do not have an advantage in the CST application process.