President, American Fluoridation Society American Fluoridation Society
Participants should be aware of the following financial/non-financial relationships: . Johnny Johnson, Jr., DMD, MS: I do not have any relevant financial / non-financial relationships with any proprietary interests.
Each year, new studies about fluoride are published, and many of them are of low quality or little relevance to water fluoridation. Dentists, dental hygienists, epidemiologists and other public health officials may be asked about these studies by patients and others.
A new guide, "How to Read a Study about Fluoride or Fluoridation," jointly produced by the British Fluoridation Society and the American Fluoridation Society can help these professionals strengthen their ability to assess research quality.
In addition, "How to Read a Study about Fluoride or Fluoridation" can be:
a. Used by faculty at dental, dental hygiene, MPH, and other graduate-level programs to enhance their students’ skills and knowledge in assessing the quality of new studies. b. Used as a tool by health journalists to better understand the strengths or weaknesses of research.
"How to Read a Study about Fluoride or Fluoridation" offers nine scientifically-based suggestions for assessing the quality of published research. The guide is accompanied by a “spoof research paper” that faculty can use to test their students’ ability to apply these nine suggestions. Right after the spoof paper are pages that identify the various problems within the spoof paper.
