Improving Access to Care for Older Adults

By Diana Macri, RDH, BSDH, MSEd

It has been 6 years since the New York Times reported on the epidemic of poor oral hygiene and its consequences in long-term care facilities (LTCF).¹ Researchers continue to uncover the pathways by which disease is initiated and how it spreads, but we now know that oral disease is the result of an imbalance between the host and its oral microbiome. Left undisrupted, oral organisms will form biofilms, communities of microbes that work together to survive and initiate host responses which often results in disease. Increasingly, we are reminded of the utility of Alfred Fones’, DDS, vision of disease prevention by the removal of plaque on teeth.²

* References can be found in the original article via the link below.
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