Abstract
Pretreatment dental screening aims to locate and eliminate oral foci of infection in order to eliminate local, loco‐regional, or systemic complications during and after oncologic treatment. An oral focus of infection is a pathologic process in the oral cavity that does not cause major infectious problems in healthy individuals, but may lead to severe local or systemic inflammation in patients subjected to oncologic treatment. As head and neck radiotherapy patients bear a lifelong risk on oral sequelae resulting from this therapy, the effects of chemotherapy on healthy oral tissues are essentially temporary and reversible. This has a large impact on what to consider as an oral focus of infection when patients are subjected to, for example, head and neck radiotherapy for cancer or intensive chemotherapy for hematological disorders. While in patients subjected to head and neck radiotherapy oral foci of infection have to be removed before therapy that may cause problems ultimately, in patients that will receive chemotherapy such, so‐called chronic, foci of infection are not in need of removal of teeth but can be treated during a remission phase. Acute foci of infection always have to be removed before or early after the onset of any oncologic treatment.
Highlights
Pretreatment dental screening aims to locate and eliminate oral foci of infection in order to prevent local, loco-regional, or systemic complications during and after oncologic or other medical treatments (Beech, Robinson, Porceddu, & Batstone, 2014; Eliyas, Al-Khayatt, Porter, & Briggs, 2013; Hong et al, 2010; Schuurhuis et al, 2015)
Observed potential oral foci of infection include caries profunda, periodontal disease, periapical problems, impacted or partially erupted teeth not fully covered by bone or showing radiolucency, cysts, non-vital pulps, and ulcerations (BenDavid et al, 2007; Jansma et al, 1992; Schuurhuis et al, 2015; Stokman, Vissink, & Spijkervet, 2008)
The risk of developing complications related to chronic oral foci of infection is probably not higher than in healthy subjects once patients have recovered from chemotherapy and their blood levels have normalized
Summary
Spijkervet, F K L; Schuurhuis, J M; Stokman, M A; Witjes, M H J; Vissink, A. Document Version Publisher's PDF, known as Version of record. Citation for published version (APA): Spijkervet, F. More information can be found on the University of Groningen website: https://www.rug.nl/library/open-access/self-archiving-pure/taverneamendment. Take-down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. For technical reasons the number of authors shown on this cover page is limited to 10 maximum
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