Reports of dental research appearing on this page represent a small snapshot of the 66 studies from the School of Dental Medicine that were presented last week at the combined meeting of the American Association of Dental Research and the International Association of Dental Research, held this year in Vancouver.

"This school is always a major presence at the premiere dental-research meeting, in terms of faculty as well as students - dental, postgraduate and Ph.D.," said Louis J. Goldberg, dean of the dental school, who attended the meeting along with several faculty and student presenters. Robert J. Genco, SUNY Distinguished Professor and chair of the Department of Oral Biology, and Sara G. Grossi, senior research scientist in that department, chaired symposia on the role of periodontal disease and systemic disease, an area in which UB plays a leading role.

Research areas ranged from basic research into cellular mechanisms of pathogens, carcinogenesis and the role of HIV in periodontal disease, to bone-regeneration research, product studies and population-based epidemiological analyses.

Study may result in better TMD treatment

By CHRISTINE VIDAL
News Services Editor

Studies conducted by a UB dental researcher could lead to better treatments for temporomandibular disorders (TMD), a condition that can affect sufferers' abilities to eat, swallow, yawn-and kiss.

Richard Ohrbach, assistant professor of oral diagnostic sciences, and colleagues presented their findings Friday. Their research could affect treatment of TMD and other chronic pain disorders.

TMD is characterized by pain or dysfunction of the masticatory system. The condition can lead to difficulties with eating, drinking, swallowing, talking-any activity that involves the mouth and jaw, even kissing, Ohrbach said.

In a study that examined the effects of relaxation on TMD symptoms, participants were randomly assigned to spend 30 minutes a day listening to a relaxation tape or, as a control group, listening to the music of their choice for 30 minutes.

Also as part of the study, researchers examined the effects of muscle rehabilitation by randomly assigning members of another group jaw-stretching exercises. Chronic pain often is accompanied by muscle tightness and shortening. Researchers wanted to study whether stretching into pain could result in better pain reduction.

Participants were divided into three groups for muscle-rehabilitation treatment. One group stretched its jaw muscles, but stopped short of the point where stretching caused pain. The second group was asked to stretch into pain. The third, control group, was asked to massage its jaw muscles.

After three weeks, all study participants were asked to rate their symptoms. Surprisingly, both the relaxation and music groups showed similar results.

Managing time and taking control are fundamental to pain management, Ohrbach said, noting that of the 41 people who started the program, 11 dropped out because they could not find the time to do the 30-minute relaxation exercise.

Researchers also found that participants who had stretched into pain compared to the other muscle treatments reported a significant decrease in their TMD pain when opening their jaws, suggesting a way to improve a treatment already often used.

James Uyanik, a senior honors student, helped design and conduct the research study.

A second study, conducted in collaboration with Carl Granger, professor and chair of the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine in the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences; Samuel Markello, research assistant professor in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, and Brenda Horrell, a graduate student in the Department of Oral Diagnostic Sciences in the School of Dental Medicine, looked at developing a reliable measure of jaw disability. The scale looks at the hierarchy of increasing disability associated with common behaviors, such as eating, drinking, swallowing and talking.

The project was designed to allow researchers to develop a scale that would allow health practitioners to assess the impact of TMD in terms of functional limitations.

A third study looked at trying to understand the physical and psychological dimensions that explain the problems TMD sufferers have.

"We have a lot of ways to measure pain," Ohrbach said. But researchers have had limited ways to quantify the symptoms of TMD and their interrelationships.

Colleagues at the University of Washington conducted a five-year study of TMD pain to better understand the relationship between TMD pain, the physical characteristics and the psychological impact that can accompany the disease, such as depression, anxiety and somatization, or non-specific physical symptoms.

The results show that there are reliable and largely independent aspects that characterize TMD: pain, physical status and psychological status, suggesting that all three domains need attention because each exerts its own impact on the individual.

"We're trying to understand the dimensions that explain the problems people have," Ohrbach said.

"A lot of people who have pain have problems that extend beyond the body," he continued. "The pain may have begun with something that is wrong with the body, but there are secondary problems that keep the patient seeking treatment for something that often no longer exists, at least in its original form. Our research...indicates that these multiple aspects cannot be ignored."

For more detail, go to http://www.buffalo.edu/news/Latest/OrhbachTMD.html.

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