Alcohol: a drug in a class of its own

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Ian Hamilton summarises a systematic review published last week, which explores the role of alcohol use and drinking patterns in socioeconomic inequalities in mortality.

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Play in the pandemic

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Helen Dodd summarises a recent rapid review of the impact of quarantine and restricted environments on children’s play and health outcomes.

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Dentine hypersensitivity: lasers v topical desensitising agents

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This review comparing the effectiveness of lasers and topical desensitising agent treatments for dentine hypersensitivity included 13 studies. None of the studies was at low risk of bias so the evidence is of low-quality and insufficient to draw any conclusions on the superiority of lasers or conventional topical desensitising agents.

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Trainee doctors’ attitudes to mental illness among their peers

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Penelope Zoe Stavrou summarises a recent qualitative study exploring UK trainee doctors’ attitudes to mental illness among their peers and their access to support services.

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Social media to diagnose depression: should this be used to target mental health care?

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In their debut blog, Rina Dutta and Charlotte Cliffe summarise a mixed methods study, which explores public opinion about using social media to diagnose depression.

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FFP3 fit testing accuracy and Covid-19 prevalence update

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In another of his series of blogs on Covid-19 Mark-Steven Howe looks at the latest data on prevalence from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) and data on the fit testing of FFP3 masks.

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Triphala mouthwash for plaque-induced gingivitis

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This review of the efficacy of Triphala and chlorhexidine mouthwash in the treatment of plaque-induced gingivitis included 7 RCTs involving a total of 1270 patients. However most of the studies are of short duration at at high to medium risk of bias.

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Online psychotherapy for the COVID era: digital healthcare with insights from Auschwitz?

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M. David Enoch writes his debut elf blog on a recent article in the BJPsych Bulletin about the trailblazing use of online interventions to enable autonomous psychological care.

His blog also suggests that during the current pandemic we may learn something important from Viktor Frankl’s Logotherapy, which was born out of the horrors of the World War II concentration camps.

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Gingival displacement: Conventional cord versus cordless techniques

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Thibault Colloc in his first blog for the Dental Elf looks at this review comparing gingival displacement with conventional cords and cordless techniques. The findings suggest that the sulcus width displacement is increased with cord technique compared to cordless technique but the available studies are all at high risk of bias.

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