Nursing, dentistry faculty collaborate for kids
Two interprofessional research studies aimed at improving children’s health grew out of ajoint workshopthat brought together faculty from Cizik School of Nursing and the School of Dentistry at UTHealth Houston.
The SOD-CSON Joint Seed Award Program is providing a pair of two-year, $20,000 grants to interprofessional teams collaborating on early stage research programs that will address critically important health problems. One team seeks to identify risk factors and prevent adverse events following in-office sedation of pediatric dental patients, and the other will implement a combination oral health and nutritional literacy program at a school in an underserved neighborhood.
“We are so thrilled for the opportunity to collaborate with the School of Dentistry,” said ProfessorConstance M. Johnson, PhD, RN, FAAN, the associate dean for research at Cizik School of Nursing. “Interdisciplinary studies such as these awarded to our faculty are critical to not only advance our fundamental understanding of health care issues, but to also solve significant problems in our community.”
“看到SOD和CSON教职员工之间成立了新的合作团队以及他们的创新项目，这是一个非常满意的，他们解决了重要的口头和一般健康问题。我们希望这种壁上资金的机会使团队能够扩大他们的研究努力，以持续成功。beplay苹果手机能用吗
Safer sedation
Assistant ProfessorDeniz Dishman, PhD, CRNA, was not able to attend the April 9, 2021, event because she was in clinical practice providing anesthesia to patients in an operating room. When she later reviewed a summary from the workshop, a research proposal by Associate ProfessorBrett Chiquet, DDS, PhD, caught her eye.
Their joint study, titled “Identifying the Incidence of Post-Sedation Adverse Events in Pediatric Dentistry,” presents an ideal vehicle for collaboration between a pediatric dentist and a nurse anesthetist. They will be breaking new ground on a little-studied topic.
Some children may be lethargic, walk with an unsteady gait, or experience poor oxygenation after dental anesthesia. “We don’t know which adverse events are most common, or which patients are most at risk,” Dishman said.
除了进行深入审查再保险levant literature, the co-principal investigators and their team will look for documented adverse events among 1,500 previous pediatric sedation cases from the School of Dentistry’s Postgraduate Clinic. They will then apply what they learn as they interview parents 24 hours after procedures. The team hopes to identify common medical or physical characteristics among patients who experience adverse events and are particularly interested in exploring whether a relationship exists between post-anesthesia complications and obstructive sleep apnea.
The ultimate goal is to adapt or develop a sensor device for at-risk children to wear after in-office sedation for dental procedures. The sensor would detect problems such as low oxygen levels and alert parents.
“If we can determine which patients are at increased risk for adverse events and prevent them from occurring, our project will be a success,” Chiquet said.
The grant is funded by the School of Dentistry. Other collaborators are Professor Xiaoqian Jiang, PhD, of the UTHealth School of Biomedical Informatics; School of Dentistry Senior Statistician and Quantitative Biologist J. Nathanial Holland, PhD; and Melanie Wright, PhD, an associate professor in the College of Pharmacy at Idaho State University’s Meridian Health Sciences Center.
“Improving oral health… improving overall health”
A collaboration led by co-principal investigatorsDaphne Hernandez，PhD，MSED，FAAHB和Margo Melchor, RDH, MED, EdD, epitomizes the dental school’s vision statement. The pair met during a UTHealth Houston leadership course and later discovered their overlapping research interests at the joint workshop.
Their study, titled “Exploring the feasibility of using interprofessional education to deliver Nourishing Smiles to underserved adolescents in Houston area schools,” will educate nursing and dental hygiene students to deliver a combined oral health and nutrition program, including dental referrals, at local schools.
“As a dental hygienist, when we provide oral hygiene education to our patients, it also includes nutritional counseling,” said Melchor, an associate professor at the School of Dentistry.
The “Nourishing Smiles” project will meld elements of the UTHealth School of Public Health’sNourishprogram with the American Dental Association’sSmile Smarts!curriculum, explained Hernandez, an associate professor at Cizik School of Nursing.
她说：“营养不良会导致口腔健康问题，从而导致更大的健康问题。”他指出，大约四分之一的黑人和西班牙裔青少年年龄在低收入家庭中年龄在12-19岁之间，经历了未经治疗的蛀牙。许多人缺乏保险和获得常规的口服或一般医疗保健。
The grant will enable the team to develop and deliver a curriculum to a few dozen students at a local school. If the implementation proves successful, they hope to secure additional funding to expand the program to more schools and classrooms.
他们在提案摘要中说：“该项目有可能减少健康差异并扩大劳动力能力以实施循证口腔健康促进实践。”
The “Nourishing Smiles” grant is funded by Cizik School of Nursing. Additional collaborators are Assistant Professor John Wesley McWhorter, Dr.PH, MS, RD, LD, CSCS, from the School of Public Health, and Associate Professor Maja Djukic, PhD, RN, FAAN; Assistant Professor Allison Edwards, DrPH, MS, CNE; and Postdoctoral Research Fellow Allison N. Marshall, PhD, MSSW, MPH, from Cizik School of Nursing.
