Preventive behavioral interventions for oral cancer in dental practice: Topical trends in tobacco and alcohol publications in jada: 1980 – 2010

Purpose: While tobacco and alcohol represent major oropharyngeal cancer risk factors, tobacco cessation initiatives have evolved in dental practice, while interventions for alcohol abuse have not. To assess the relative professional attention paid to these substances and their health implications, we reviewed the Journal of the American Dental Association (JADA) between 1980 – 2010 to assess differences in publication trends for tobacco and alcohol in specific themes involving the relation of these substances to oral health, oral cancer, and screening/intervention in dental practice. Methods: NVivo software was used to code JADA publication abstracts including keywords ‘tobacco' or ‘alcohol' between 1980 – 2010 for major topics. Differences in trends by decade for tobacco and alcohol are described. Results: N = 143 articles (tobacco = 98 (69%); alcohol = 45 (31%), representing between 1.2 – 2.5% of the total publications in JADA between 1980 and 2010) were identified. The number of publications increased by decade from the 1980's (31; 22%), 1990's (50; 35%), to 2000's (62; 43%). Concerns for oral health effects, oral cancer linkages, and interventions emerged earlier for tobacco (1980's and 1990's) than for alcohol (2000's). However, only 2 articles suggesting alcohol counseling appeared between 2000 – 2010. Conclusions: This review suggests that the literature in JADA regarding tobacco cessation in dental practice has evolved further and a decade or 2 faster than for alcohol screening/interventions. As dental-practice based interventions for tobacco and alcohol share an underlying rationale, our results hopefully point to future development of alcohol and/or combined interventions.