News
GSDM Professor Wins BU Ignition Award to Aid Project Development on Permanent Tooth Enamel Restoration Process
Current tooth enamel restoration techniques are expensive, invasive, and are seen as non-permeant solutions, but one of the 2023 Boston University Ignition Awards winners – a GSDM professor and his team – are now one step closer to creating a permanent solution. More
The 2023 Boston Head & Neck Cancer Symposium Focused on Human Impact and Patient Experiences
The patient perspective—as valuable as it is—frequently is overlooked during scientific and clinical applications. To help address this, the 2023 Boston Head & Neck Cancer Symposium, held on October 6, championed the patient voice, most notably by adding for the first time a patient panel with three cancer survivors. More
Alumni Spotlight: The “Mother Teresa” of Dentistry – Teresa Grygo DMD 86
Teresa Grygo DMD 86 was honored at the 2023 GSDM Alumni Weekend reception with this year’s distinguished alumni award. After 37 years of dental practice, Grygo has worked in private practice, corporate dentistry, and public health, but she said working with patients affected by homelessness has been the most rewarding. She said she accepted the award on behalf of all her patients, as those affected by homelessness tend to be “invisible,” and this was her way of making them seen. More
THE GLOBAL-LOCAL TENSION
In June 2023, the Cambodia National Action Plan for Oral Health was signed off by the Minister of Health, Cambodia. The approach that the team at the Oral Heatlh Bureau (Cambodia) took was to actively reach out to stakeholders at all levels using a “networking approach” as a way to generate support for implementation. More
THE CIRCULAR NATURE OF DEVELOPMENT
Over the last 30 or more years, there have been repeated calls to establish a minimum package of primary oral health care services in low-resource settings. In the late 80s, there was a call for a “primary health care” approach for addressing access to oral health care, and by the mid 90s, there was a growing body of evidence... More
THE ORIGINAL STORY
In 2020, Dr Sanjay Matthew and his team at MulakTimor, a local non-governmental organization (NGO), were attempting to get permission to develop a training template for government employees to start placing silver diammine fluoride (SDF). The Oral Health Bureau (Ministry of Health, Timor Leste) agreed on the condition that the NGO would write a set of standard treatment guidelines for the delivery of... More
“I Found My Wizard of Oz:” Patient Educator Shares Her Pemphigus Vulgaris Diagnostic Journey as Part of GSDM Rare Patient Seminar Series
Ellen Levine, a patient educator with the International Pemphigus & Pemphigoid Foundation (IPPF), was diagnosed with the rare autoimmune disorder pemphigus vulgaris and has been living with the disease for 16 years. This is Levine’s third time speaking to the GSDM community with the goal of increasing awareness about pemphigus and pemphigoid. More
Research Spotlight: GSDM’s Michelle Henshaw Co-leads New HIV and Oral Health Scientific Working Group
Dr. Michelle Henshaw SPH 96, GSDM associate dean of global & population health, and two co-leaders are leading a new scientific working group focusing on HIV and oral health research with the Providence/Boston Center for AIDS Research (Prov/Bos CFAR.) More
Research Spotlight: F31 Grant Recipient Examines Connection Between Preconception Periodontitis and Reproductive health
In 2022, Julia Bond SPH 24 received a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award Individual Predoctoral Fellowship (F31 grant) from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research to examine the association between preconception periodontitis and reproductive health outcomes. Now, halfway through the grant, Bond said it has been a wonderful experience participating in high quality oral health research using self-reported observational data. More
Community Highlight: GSDM “Tooth Twins”
What are the odds that three sets of twins ended up at the same dental school at the same time? GSDM Communications spoke to three current GSDM student twin sets about their remarkable paths to dentistry and their experiences being dental peers–a phenomenon we've dubbed “Tooth Twins.” More