McMaine Presents Progress on Converge Grant-Funded Research

Dr. Travis McMaine, Assistant Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery at Augusta University, was awarded a grant from the Office of the Provost at AU and recently presented his research progress at the 2023 Converge Rural Health Symposium. McMaine is working with Dr. Ekta Gupta, a lecturer for the Institute of Dentistry at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, on “Study of rural residents using urgent care and emergency departments for dental care: Examination of the relationship between visits to urgent care facilities and emergency departments due to non-traumatic dental conditions among residents of DHPSAs in the state of Georgia (GA) as well as Aberdeen and surrounding areas.”

“We are gathering data from emergency and urgent care centers in rural Georgia counties delegated a Dental Health Professional Shortage Area (DHPSA) for their visits for non-trauma-related dental complaints such as tooth pain or infection,” McMaine said. “These issues typically are only temporized with antibiotics or pain medications, as no source control treatment can be rendered by a medical provider (root canal, extraction). We find the outcome of these visits (referral, escalation of care, admission) and if the patient received narcotics. We will compare distance to dental providers and see if there are correlations.”