Dentists Can Identify People with Undiagnosed Diabetes

According to a recent study performed by researchers at Columbia University College of Dental Medicine, "dental visits represented a chance to intervene in the diabetes epidemic by identifying individuals with diabetes or pre-diabetes who are unaware of their condition."

From the nearly 600 individuals who were recruited for the study, half of the group was non-Hispanic, white 40-years-old or older; the other half were Hispanic, or non-white, 30-years-old or older.  None of them had been ever told that they have diabetes or pre-diabetes.

African-Americans Get a Raw Deal on Dental Care?

The fact that African Americans tend to get poorer dental care in comparison to white Americans peaked the interest of researchers at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health and the College of Dental Medicine.  The researchers surveyed African American adults with recent oral health symptoms.

The poll was conducted through a qualitative survey of 118 men and women.  Despite the fact that most of adults (75 percent) in the study claimed to have at least some type of dental insurance coverage, it was appreciably limited to Medicaid (50%) only 21% claimed to have a private coverage and 4 % noted other types of dental insurance.