Power of AI Is Harnessed to Improve Access to Oral Healthcare
A $3.1 million grant will help researchers at Eastman Institute for Oral Health develop an AI platform that can be used to predict, diagnose, and treat oral diseases.
What keeps patients away from the dental clinic? Lack of insurance, no transportation, few available providers, inability to take time off work … the list goes on. And the consequences of no dental care are significant: more than 60% of Americans age 65 and older have some type of periodontal disease and 57% of teenagers have had at least one carious lesion.
The Eastman Institute for Oral Health (EIOH) in Rochester, New York, wants to change this by building an artificial intelligence (AI)-based platform that takes the guesswork out of dental care and moves the provision of dental care outside of the traditional private practice.
Funded by a $3.1 million grant from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, the EIOH team is building a new model that is designed to identify disease in its earliest stages, provide data on which populations are at highest risk for disease, and connect patients to treatment before their oral health issues become severe.
The SMARTeeth++ technology uses portable radiography and medical/dental histories to detect the early symptoms of periodontal diseases and dental caries. A predictive model is also included that will help clinicians identify those patients who may be at greatest risk for swift disease progression. The system will also be available for nonoral health professionals to use.
The goal is to use SMARTeeth++ to transition oral healthcare from the clinic-based model to a prevention- and outcomes-focused system. Click here to read more.
