Dental research: garbage in, garbage out

Abstract

In the past decades the digital revolution has definitively reshaped every aspect of healthcare in a multidimensional way. Translational Medicine has emerged as a new paradigm to shorten the gap between the bench and patient chair side whereas applicable clinical research is concerned. The digital access to medical information enabled the uprising of powerful synthesis of clinical research underpinning clinical recommendations based on sound evidence. Tools for critically appraisal clinical evidence have given us the conscience that traditional research designs like the clinical trial needed to be re-assessed and adjusted to different needs and purposes like the inclusion of Patient Reported Outcomes as new outcomes of interest in clinical research. Comparative effectiveness research lighted on the conscience that new designs along with more realistic research settings were needed, which in turn generated the practice based research networks as new theatres for modern clinical research. Dissemination of evidence is an intricate matrix of events but no strong clinical recommendations can be attained without sound research at its inception. Where do we come from, where do we stand for and where are we going to in dental research? How does one integrate these multi dimensional challenges in health research with the dental field? These are the focus of this conference.