Value of research carried out in dental practice

Evidence-based dentistry needs to have information relevant to the dental primary care setting in order to help general dental practitioners improve their patients' oral health outcomes.No summary of clinical research exclusively conducted in the dental primary care setting has previously been available.This review identifies forty three clinical trials conducted in dental primary care from the Cochrane Controlled Trials Register.A description of the studies is followed with a discussion of the merits and shortcomings of the research designs used.The review found no evaluations of strategies to improve general dental practitioner's participation in primary care-based clinical research.