Mouthwash, mouth rinse, oral rinse, or mouth bath is a liquid which is held in the mouth passively or swirled around the mouth by contraction of the perioral muscles and/or movement of the head, and may be gargled, where the head is tilted back and the liquid bubbled at the back of the mouth.
Oral leukoplakia is a potentially malignant disorder affecting the oral mucosa. It is defined as "essentially an oral mucosal white lesion that cannot be considered as any other definable lesion." Oral leukoplakia is a white patch or plaque that develops in the oral cavity and is strongly associated with smoking. Leukoplakia is a firmly attached white patch on a mucous membrane which is associated with increased risk of cancer. The edges of the lesion are typically abrupt and the lesion changes with time. Advanced forms may develop red patches. There are generally no other symptoms. It usually occurs within the mouth, although sometimes mucosa in other parts of the gastrointestinal tract, urinary tract, or genitals may be affected.
The National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) is a branch of the U.S. National Institutes of Health. The institute aims to improve the oral, dental, and craniofacial health through research and the distribution of important health information to the American people.
The Columbia University College of Dental Medicine, often abbreviated CDM, is one of the 21 graduate and professional schools of Columbia University. It is located at 630 West 168th Street in Manhattan, New York City. According to American Dental Education Association, CDM is one of the most selective dental schools in the United States based on average DAT score, GPA, and acceptance rate. In 2017, 1,657 people applied for 84 positions in its entering class. The median undergraduate GPA and average DAT score for successful applicants in 2020 were 3.62 and 22.8, respectively.
The UAB School of Dentistry is the dental school of the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) in Birmingham, Alabama, United States. It was founded in 1948 and is the only dental school in Alabama.
The UCSF School of Dentistry is the dental school of the University of California, San Francisco, in San Francisco, California, in the United States. It was founded in 1881 and is the oldest dental school in California and the western United States. It is accredited by the American Dental Association. In 2016, it had received the highest NIH funding of any US dental school for 25 consecutive years. It is one of the top dental schools in the world, being ranked #5 by QS World University Rankings and 7 by Academic Ranking of World Universities.
The University of Washington School of Dentistry is the dental school of the University of Washington in Seattle. It is the only school of dentistry in the state of Washington. The school emphasizes research in anxiety, orofacial pain, tissue repair and regeneration, immune response to bacteria, and practice based research.
The UNC Claude A. Adams Jr. and Grace Phillips Adams School of Dentistry is the school of dentistry of the University of North Carolina. It is located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States. It is currently ranked second among all dental schools in the U.S. and is consistently ranked among the best in the world according to two independent rankings. Founded in 1950 as the UNC School of Dentistry, it was the only dental school in North Carolina until 2011, when East Carolina University School of Dental Medicine became the second. In 2019, the school received its largest single donation of $27.68 million, resulting in a name change to honor Dr. Claude A. Adams Jr. and Grace Phillips Adams. Dr. Adams was a North Carolina dentist that practiced in Durham until his death in 2018.
Salivary gland diseases (SGDs) are multiple and varied in cause. There are three paired major salivary glands in humans: the parotid glands, the submandibular glands, and the sublingual glands. There are also about 800–1,000 minor salivary glands in the mucosa of the mouth. The parotid glands are in front of the ears, one on side, and secrete mostly serous saliva, via the parotid ducts, into the mouth, usually opening roughly opposite the second upper molars. The submandibular gland is medial to the angle of the mandible, and it drains its mixture of serous and mucous saliva via the submandibular duct into the mouth, usually opening in a punctum in the floor of mouth. The sublingual gland is below the tongue, on the floor of the mouth; it drains its mostly mucous saliva into the mouth via about 8–20 ducts, which open along the plica sublingualis, a fold of tissue under the tongue.
No-Hee Park is a distinguished professor of dentistry and dean emeritus at the School of Dentistry at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is also a researcher and scientist in the field of oral and craniofacial research. He has more than 170 scientific publications, nine invited review articles, nine book chapters and 180 abstracts for national and international scientific presentations.
Martha J. Somerman is an internationally known researcher and educator in medicine, focusing on defining the key regulators controlling development, maintenance, and regeneration of dental, oral, and craniofacial tissues. She was Chief of the Laboratory of Oral Connective Tissue Biology (LOCTB) at the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) and Director of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) located in Bethesda, Maryland. She was the first woman to lead NIDCR. Dr. Somerman retired as the director of NIDCR on December 31, 2019, serving nine years.
Human immunodeficiency virus salivary gland disease, is swelling of the salivary glands and/or xerostomia in individuals infected with human immunodeficiency virus.
Stephen James Challacombe FRC(Path), FDSRCS, FMedSci, is professor of oral medicine at King's College in London, best known for research in oromucosal immunology and for developing the Challacombe scale for measuring the extent of dryness of the mouth. He led the team that laid out research challenges of global health inequalities and oral health, particularly relating to the oral manifestations of HIV.
Kaumudi Jinraj Joshipura is an Indian American Epidemiologist, Biostatistician, Dentist & Scientist. She is Adjunct Full Professor at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health (HSPH) at Harvard University and NIH Endowed Chair and Director of the Center for Clinical Research and Health Promotion and a Full Professor at the University of Puerto Rico, Medical Sciences Campus. Her research work has been covered by global media including CNN, ABC, NBC, NHS, Newsweek, Nature, Telegraph, Japanese Journals and Japanese TV etc.
John S. Greenspan was an academic dentist/scientist and university administrator. His degrees and diplomas include BSc, BDS, Ph.D., FRCPath, FDSRCS (Eng). He was the Director-Emeritus of the AIDS Research Institute at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He was also the founding Director of the UCSF AIDS Specimen Bank (1982-2017) and of the UCSF Oral AIDS Center (1986–2005).
Niki M. Moutsopoulos is a Greek periodontist and immunologist. She is a senior investigator in the oral immunity and infection section at the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. Moutsopoulos specializes in oral immunology and periodontitis. Her research program focuses on host-microbial interactions that can drive chronic inflammatory responses and tissue destruction in the oral cavity.
Rena N. D'Souza is a clinician-scientist and Director of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research. She was formerly the assistant vice president for academic affairs and education for health sciences at the University of Utah where she was also a Professor of Dentistry in the School of Dentistry and a Professor of Neurobiology and Anatomy in the School of Medicine.
Ophir David Klein is an American developmental biologist who specializes in pediatric medical genetics. Klein is Executive Director of Cedars-Sinai Guerin Children’s, Vice Dean for Children’s Services, Professor of Pediatrics, and the David and Meredith Kaplan Distinguished Chair in Children’s Health. He is also a professor of Orofacial Sciences and Pediatrics at UCSF.
Lawrence A. Tabak is an American dentist and biomedical scientist serving as the principal deputy director of the National Institutes of Health. He served as acting director from 2021 to 2023. Previously he was the director of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research from 2000 to 2010.
A. Isabel Garcia is an American dentist and academic administrator serving as dean of the University of Florida College of Dentistry since 2015. She was deputy director of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) from 2007 to 2014. Garcia was the acting NIDCR director from 2010 to 2011. She was a Rear Admiral Lower Half in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.
