CE: When 1 + 1 ≠ 2: Rethinking the Complexity of Dental Diseases

Program Outline

The restoration was perfect. The scaling was thorough. The anatomy was corrected. So why didn’t the patient get better?

Sometimes we do everything technically right, yet disease persists, recurs, or responds differently than expected. As dental science evolves, we are learning that many of the conditions we manage every day cannot be explained by a single organism, anatomical finding, risk factor, or behaviour. What appears to be “the cause” may be only one part of a much larger biological system.

Using familiar clinical scenarios and emerging evidence, this presentation will explore how microbial ecology, host response, genetics, anatomy, physiology, behaviour and environment interact to influence disease. We will consider how to distinguish an associated finding from an important disease driver, why correcting one factor may not always change the outcome, and when looking beyond the most obvious explanation may alter our clinical approach.

The goal is not to…