U.S. dentistry fights medical device tax; who owns your electronic data?

Dear DrBicuspid member,

Despite significant lobbying efforts by organized dentistry, the new 2.3% medical device tax set to take effect January 1 continues to loom over the U.S. industry.

Another nail was driven into the coffin last week when the Internal Revenue Service issued its final regulations regarding the tax, ignoring numerous requests during the public comment period to exempt dental products and devices from the tax. But the fight is not over, according to the Dental Trade Alliance. Click here to read more, including a list of the types of products that will likely be subject to the tax.

In other dental news, the clinical oral exam (COE) is the most common technique used by dental practitioners to detect abnormal oral mucosal changes that can indicate precancerous or cancerous lesions. But a meta-analysis in the December Journal of the American Dental Association concluded that COEs are actually poor predictors of oral cancer risk. Read more.

And a new study in Lasers in Medical Science found that diode lasers can significantly improve clinical parameters when used as an adjunct to scaling and root planing during periodontal treatment.

Finally, as digital technology and electronic health records stored in the cloud continue to make their way into dentistry, they generate legal, moral, and philosophical questions our existing ethical framework is simply not equipped to handle. This dilemma has prompted Dr. Larry Emmott to ask: Who really owns the data? His answers might surprise you. Read more.