The contrasting short‐term effects of COVID‐19 on dental care practices in the United States

Abstract Objectives The study utilized a cross‐sectional survey to determine the short‐term effects of the COVID‐19 pandemic on dental care practices. The authors hypothesized that the effects of the pandemic would indicate differences based on the ethnicity of the participating dentist. Materials and Methods The survey was available online between June 1, 2020 and July 10, 2020, a period when many dental offices remained closed, and for the most part, unable to provide non‐emergency dental care. The link to the survey was made available to dentists through outreach to several national dental organizations. Descriptive statistics summarized the characteristics of the entire sample and Fisher's exact test was used to examine respondents' answers stratified by ethnicity using frequencies and percentages. Results All ethnic groups reported decreased revenue and African American dentists were the least likely to report a decrease in revenue compared to White and Other ethnic groups (84.2%, 87.2% and 92.9%). African American dentists were the most likely to report willingness to contribute to a task force to address the new challenges resulting from COVID‐19 when compared to White and Other ethnic groups (46.4%, 18.8%, and 29.6%, respectively). African American dentists were more likely to indicate a need for a stronger connection to academic programs as compared to White or Other dentists in order to address current and future challenges (12.3%, 0.0%, and 9.1%). Conclusion The COVID‐19 pandemic has affected dental practices differently, highlighting racial disparities, and strategies that factor in the race or ethnicity of the dentist and the communities in which they practice need to be considered to ensure that underserved communities receive needed resources

The contrasting short-term effects of COVID-19 on dental care practices in the United States

Objectives: The study utilized a cross-sectional survey to determine the short-term effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on dental care practices. The authors hypothesized that the effects of the pandemic would indicate differences based on the ethnicity of the participating dentist. Materials and Methods: The survey was available online between June 1, 2020 and July 10, 2020, a period when many dental offices remained closed, and for the most part, unable to provide non-emergency dental care. The link to the survey was made available to dentists through outreach to several national dental organizations. Descriptive statistics summarized the characteristics of the entire sample and Fisher\u27s exact test was used to examine respondents\u27 answers stratified by ethnicity using frequencies and percentages. Results: All ethnic groups reported decreased revenue and African American dentists were the least likely to report a decrease in revenue compared to White and Other ethnic groups (84.2%, 87.2% and 92.9%). African American dentists were the most likely to report willingness to contribute to a task force to address the new challenges resulting from COVID-19 when compared to White and Other ethnic groups (46.4%, 18.8%, and 29.6%, respectively). African American dentists were more likely to indicate a need for a stronger connection to academic programs as compared to White or Other dentists in order to address current and future challenges (12.3%, 0.0%, and 9.1%). Conclusion: The COVID-19 pandemic has affected dental practices differently, highlighting racial disparities, and strategies that factor in the race or ethnicity of the dentist and the communities in which they practice need to be considered to ensure that underserved communities receive needed resources

A simple and rapid protocol to non-enzymatically dissociate fresh human tissues for the analysis of infiltrating lymphocytes.

The ability of malignant cells to evade the immune system, characterized by tumor escape from both innate and adaptive immune responses, isnow accepted as an important hallmark of cancer. Our research on breast cancer focuses on the active role that tumor infiltrating lymphocytesplay in tumor progression and patient outcome. Toward this goal, we developed a methodology for the rapid isolation of intact lymphoid cellsfrom normal and abnormal tissues in an effort to evaluate them proximate to their native state. Homogenates prepared using a mechanicaldissociator show both increased viability and cell recovery while preserving surface receptor expression compared to enzyme-digested tissues.Furthermore, enzymatic digestion of the remaining insoluble material did not recover additional CD45+ cells indicating that quantitative and qualitative measurements in the primary homogenate likely genuinely reflect infiltrating subpopulations in the tissue fragment. The lymphoidcells in these homogenates can be easily characterized using immunological (phenotype, proliferation, etc.) or molecular (DNA, RNA and/orprotein) approaches. CD45+ cells can also be used for subpopulation purification, in vitro expansion or cryopreservation. An additional benefitof this approach is that the primary tissue supernatant from the homogenates can be used to characterize and compare cytokines, chemokines,immunoglobulins and antigens present in normal and malignant tissues. This protocol functions extremely well for human breast tissues andshould be applicable to a wide variety of normal and abnormal tissues.The video component of this article can be found at http://www.jove.com/video/52392/info:eu-repo/semantics/publishe