8. Oral Health Research
Oral Health Research
The New Zealand Dental Association position is:
That achieving good oral health requires a strong ongoing focus of research in New Zealand that supports population health, workforce development and improved clinical practice in a contemporary New Zealand context.
That research requires funding support, and the New Zealand Dental Association supports researchers having access to small grant funding that is specifically directed to oral health, and having access to larger research grant funds such as the Health Research Council.
The New Zealand Dental Association’s position is that achieving good oral health requires a strong ongoing focus on research that supports the public health aspects of oral health and that supports the educational programmes of our universities.
Research enables universities to develop well-qualified undergraduate and postgraduate students. As a relatively isolated country with a single university providing dentist and dental specialist education, the research programme of the University of Otago is particularly important to the development of a well-qualified workforce and the provision of high-quality dental care in New Zealand.
New Zealand has had small but dedicated research teams, primarily at universities, who have provided important insights on oral health issues from a variety of research programmes. A number of these teams have generated world-leading research in areas of life course research, health services research, oral diseases (including oral pathology), oral microbiology and dental materials.
Translation of research findings into practice is equally important and should include evidence-informed clinical practice guidelines. Researchers play an important role in supporting the development and evaluation of population oral health policies, and in evaluating and applying the evidence generated by basic science, clinical and public health research and in supporting clinical practice in New Zealand.
The New Zealand Dental Association provides financial support to dental research through the New Zealand Dental Research Foundation. It has also administered the Ministry of Health Oral Health Research Fund for over 10 years. Collectively the NZDRF and Ministry of Health funds provide around $250,000 per annum in modest grants to support emerging researchers, postgraduate research and research programmes of established teams.
The ability of research teams to access funds beyond these small grants, (such as the Health Research Council) is critical to ensure viable programmes at our universities and research institutes.