A new definition for oral health developed by the FDI World Dental Federation opens the door to a universal definition of oral health

A selection of abstracts of clinically relevant papers from other journals. The abstracts on this page have been chosen and edited by John R. Radford.

Abstract

'...that will enable a conversation...'

Main

Glick M, Williams D et al. J Public Health Dentist 2017;77: 3–5

Such is considered the importance of this definition, this Editorial published in the Journal of Public Health Dentistry, also in full JADA 2016;147: 915–917 and indeed in this Journal (Br Dent J 2016;221: 792–793), merits summarising in this section.

Dental health professionals would argue that oral health is an essential component of overall health and well-being. Other stakeholders however, may not hold this view. To develop a coherent strategy (FDI's Vision 2020 – Int Dent J 2012;62: 278–291) embracing 'health policies, research, education, and reimbursement models', a need was identified to come up with a common definition of oral health. This holistic description is hung on a framework that embraces 1) disease, 2) physiological, and 3) psychosocial function, but also recruits 4) drivers for oral health, 5) factors that influence how a person rates their oral health, and finally 4) overall health and wellbeing.