Robot dental patients!

Dentists practice on robot patients

Trainee dentists in Japan are now able to practise their skills on a robot patient designed to simulate a patient’s reaction to the dentist, reports BBC online. Simroid, the robot patient, has sensors built into its teeth and body and is capable of replicating blinks and “muffled gurgles” suggesting the ‘patient’s’ level  of comfort (or discomfort) during treatment. Professor Naotake Shibui from Nippon Dental University Hospital, who invented the prototype, says Simroid helps the trainees not only understand the technique, but also the patient’s feelings.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8137007.stm

Sweet remedy

The Daily Express and the Metro today both include brief health reports describing the teeth saving properties of an oral syrup containing natural sweetener xylitol. According to the reports, the sweetener acts as an antibacterial agent against the organisms which cause dental caries. Researchers from Washington University, who carried out a study on children aged nine to 15 months, suggest that an 8g dose of xylitol a day, in two daily doses, “could prevent up to 70 per cent of decayed teeth.”

 Marcus "Robot patients!....could only happen in the land of robots, Japan! I don't think that working on a robot simulator will really be a good substitute for the real thing, but its an interesting idea for dental students"

" The xylitol article sounds good, doesn't it? As I've said before, I think that applied mouth washes and the like are the way forward with decay and gum disease, but always remember to brush and floss and don't eat sweets frequently."

Comments

[cosmetic dentistry los angeles]

Thank you for the post, this was a good invention.

-heather-

[Tiffany Grace]

Cool