ArticleCommunity dentistry and oral epidemiology2023
Talking about cancer: Patient responses to raising awareness of oral cancer in primary dental care.
Article in Community dentistry and oral epidemiology, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed, 7 citations in OpenAlex.
- Oral Cancer Awareness, Screening Behavior, and Risk-Factor Recognition Among Patients Attending a University Dental Hospital.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Dental Visits, Dentist-Patient Communication, and Its Association with Oral Cancer Examination Behavior Among Tobacco/Nicotine Product Users in Western India: A Cross-Sectional Study.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Signaling pathways and targeted interventions for precancers.Signal transduction and targeted therapy · 2026Review
- Talking about cancer: Patient responses to raising awareness of oral cancer in primary dental care.Community dentistry and oral epidemiology · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesDentists and other members of the dental team could raise awareness by talking about oral cancer during routine dental check-ups. A communication guide has been developed to facilitate this. However, it has been suggested that discussions about oral cancer may raise patients' anxiety and this has been documented by dentists as a barrier to having these conversations. The current research aimed to investigate implementation of the communication guide and its impact on the dental patient.
methodsA consecutive-case sample of adult dental patients attending primary dental care for a routine NHS check-up at one dental practice were invited to take part in the study via letter prior to their appointment. Consultations of participating patients (n = 77) were audio-recorded. Before and after their appointment, patients were asked to rate their current anxiety via the six-item version of Spielberger's State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. Audio recordings of each consultation were reviewed by two raters to determine the extent to which the dentist covered the topics recommended in the communication guide.
resultsThe dentist informed all patients that they were being checked for oral cancer, spoke about signs and symptoms, and discussed risk factors. However, they rarely recommended where help should be sought or addressed barriers to seeking help. Discussions took an average of 95 s. The extent to which oral cancer was discussed did not correlate with patients' post-appointment anxiety. Patients made positive or neutral responses to the discussions. The few questions that were asked were easily addressed.
conclusionsAs findings are based on one dentist working at one practice, generalization of these results should be cautious. The study indicated that using an evidence-based guide to talk about oral cancer did not appear to raise patients' anxiety in this practice population. This could help to increase awareness of oral cancer in the endeavour to facilitate early cancer diagnosis.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.