Using the Beers criteria to identify potentially inappropriate medication use by older adult dental patients.

Background: An aging population indicates that increasing numbers of older adults will seek oral health care and have multiple chronic conditions treated with a number of medications. The authors examined the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey administrative data set to characterize potentially inappropriate medication (PIM) use by older adults visiting the dentist and related adverse experiences that may affect oral health care.

Methods: The authors used the 2015 Beers criteria to identify PIMs for older adults.

Cost-effectiveness of antibiotic prophylaxis for dental patients with prosthetic joints: Comparisons of antibiotic regimens for patients with total hip arthroplasty.

Background: Clinician uncertainty concerning the need for antibiotic prophylaxis to prevent prosthetic joint infection (PJI) after undergoing dental procedures persists. Improved understanding of the potential clinical and economic risks and benefits of antibiotic prophylaxis will help inform the debate and facilitate the continuing evolution of clinical management guidelines for dental patients with prosthetic joints.

Methods: The authors developed a Markov decision model to compare the lifetime cost-effectiveness of alternative antibiotic prophylaxis strategies for dental patients aged 65 years who had undergone total hip arthroplasty (THA).

Use of the Beers criteria to identify potentially inappropriate drug use by community-dwelling older dental patients.

Objective: Recognizing drugs with serious adverse experience (AE) potential in an aging population would assist practitioners in preventing drug safety issues. This study identifies drugs with potential for causing serious AEs, describes the AEs, and estimates prevalent use among older adults visiting the dentist.

Study Design: Drugs with serious AE risk for older adults were identified with the use of the Beers criteria.

Dental service trends for older US adults, 1998-2006.

This study of the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey (MCBS) updates trends in utilization of dental services between 1998 and 2006 for community-dwelling U.S. adults of age 65 years and older.

Dental procedures and subsequent prosthetic joint infections: findings from the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey.

Background: The publication of the 2009 American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons' (AAOS') guidelines for antibiotic prophylaxis after joint replacement (arthroplasty) has renewed debate concerning appropriate prophylaxis for dental patients. The authors examined an administrative data set to assess whether dental procedures were associated with prosthetic joint infections (PJIs).

Methods: Using data for the years 1997 through 2006 from the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey (MCBS), the authors identified participants who had undergone total joint arthroplasty and those who had experienced a PJI.

Potentially serious drug-drug interactions among community-dwelling older adult dental patients.

Objectives: Reducing adverse drug events, including those resulting from drug-drug interactions, will be a health safety issue of increasing importance for dental practitioners in the coming decades as greater numbers of older adults seek oral health care. The purpose of this study was to identify prescription drugs with the potential for serious interactions and estimate prevalent use among older adults visiting the dentist.

Study Design: The Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey is an ongoing series of nationally representative surveys of Medicare beneficiaries.

Demographic factors associated with dental utilization among community dwelling elderly in the United States, 1997.

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to characterize dental service utilization in 1997 by community dwelling Medicare beneficiaries.

Methods: The Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey, or MCBS, is a continuous annual series of nationally representative surveys of Medicare beneficiaries. Univariate comparisons were made between dependent variables (dental utilization and types of dental services) by each of the independent variables (age group, gender, race, income, education, population density, marital status and U.