The Foresight programme aims through a multidisciplinary approach to discover a new generation of predictive biomarkers for caries and periodontitis and use them to develop tools to improve clinician’s ability to identify patients at increased risk of oral disease, thereby reducing healthcare costs by directing resources to those in most need.

Our Research

Both severe caries and periodontitis are among the most common diseases worldwide. Recent estimates suggest the number of people affected to be at least one billion. In Sweden, about 10% of the population suffers from severe caries or gum disease with the risk of losing their teeth. The figure is expected to increase dramatically due to the continuously increasing proportion of elderly people. There is also evidence linking periodontitis and increased risk of cardiovascular disease.

The aim of Foresight is to discover and implement a new generation of predictive biomarkers for caries and periodontitis

Professor Gunnel Svensäter

There is a need to develop new biomarkers and tools for risk assessment. With the risk assessment tools available today, individual risk is often misjudged and many patients are over-treated while others do not receive the treatment they need. This over-treatment contributes significantly to the approximately 10 billion SEK a year cost of dental healthcare. Inadequate risk assessment also leads to inequality in healthcare by failing to target treatment to those most in need.

This complex problem requires the integration of different knowledge domains: discovery of predictive biomarkers and preventive biotherapeutics, sensor development, verification and clinical validation of biomarkers, risk assessment and risk philosophy as well as health economics. Rather than encompassing more of the same ‘single disciple’ research, the programme seeks to integrate researchers from different disciplines in an interdisciplinary approach.

Within the programme, five main projects with researchers from different disciplines will work with different aspects of biomarker discovery and implementation in the clinical setting. Project themes are Experimental discovery of predictive biomarkers and preventative biotherapeutics, Clinical discovery and verification of predictive biomarkers, Sensor development, Risk assessment and philosophy, and Health economics.

Several research projects are conducted within the framework of Clinical Odontological Research in Southern Sweden (KOF-SYD), a research collaboration with Public Dental Care.

Read about KOF-SYD

Illustration of the Foresight model.

The aim of Foresight is:

  • To apply a multidisciplinary approach to generate innovative strategies for the prediction of oral disease
  • To pool competencies of researchers from five different disciplines to develop a new generation of scientifically-based clinical tools to identify patients at increased risk of oral disease
  • To promote the use of oral healthcare resources in a cost-effective way by improving risk assessment and preventative regimes.

The results will be implemented both in clinical praxis and education, thereby giving thousands of people access to the outcomes of Foresight.

Researchers, publications and projects

Total hits: 17

Publications

Research projects

The research projects focus on different aspects of the discovery of predictive biomarkers for caries and periodontitis and the implementation of these biomarkers in the clinical setting using sensor technology.

Total hits: 2
Doctoral Project

Enzymatic activity in oral biofilms – biotechnological applications and putative predictive biomarkers for oral health and disease
Research Project

Detection and sensing of predictive biomarkers for periodontitis

Collaborating partners

See our partners

  • Daniel Aili, Assistant Professor, Linköping University
  • Torbjörn Bengtsson, Professor, Örebro University
  • Josephine Brodén, PhD, Malmö University/Folktandvården Uppsala
  • Thomas Davidson,  Associate Professor, Linköping University
  • Gizem Ertürk Dr, Lund University
  • Henrik Jansson, Associate Professor och forsknings och utvecklingschef, Folktandvården Skåne
  • Hazem Khalaf, Associate Professor, Örebro University
  • Rolf Lood, Associate Professor, Lund University
  • Johanna Lönn, Dr, Örebro University
  • Eleonor Palm, Dr, Örebro University
  • Stefan Rüdiger, Dr, Folktandvården Parodontologi, Region Skåne
  • Nils-Eric Sahlin, Professor, Lund University
  • Anna Svärd, Linköping University
  • Niklas Vareman, Postdoc, Lund University

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