In the recently concluded mid-term conference of Society of Periodontologist and Implantologist of Kerala (SPIK) during December 8, 2013 at Trichur, Drs. Keerthy S. Menon and Reshma Suresh, postgraduate scholars in the Department of Periodontics at the Amrita School of Dentistry won first and second prizes respectively for their paper presentations.

The conference had paper presentations in three categories viz., research, review and case presentation. Both the scholars won prizes for their papers in research category.

Dr. Keerthy’s research paper was titled Enhanced Treatment Outcomes with Calcium & Vitamin D supplementation in Chronic Periodontitis Patients.

Her paper highlighted the significance of calcium and vitamin D supplementation in patients with periodontal disease.

“Vitamin D has classically been known as a bone hormone. Evidence has demonstrated that vitamin D deficiency may place subjects at risk for not only low mineral bone density, osteoporosis and osteopenia but also infectious and chronic inflammatory diseases like periodontitis, ” elaborated Dr. Keerthy.

“At the Department of Periodontics, we did a research in patients attending regular periodontal care programmes and came to a conclusion that those patients who take calcium & vitamin D supplementation for periodontal disease had an additive effect over those patients who receive only treatments like scaling and polishing.”

The second prize winner, Dr. Reshma, presented the significance of serum sialic acid as a biomarker for the progression of periodontitis (gum disease) and diabetic status of a patient.

Her paper was titled Comparison of Serum Sialic Acid Levels in Chronic Periodontitis with and without NIDDM after Non-surgical Periodontal Therapy – A Clinicobiochemical Study.

Dr. Reshma explained further.

“Periodontitis is considered as the sixth complication of diabetes mellitus. During its inflammatory cascade, activation of acute phase protein takes place. One such acute phase protein is sialic acid, acetylated form of neuraminic acid.”

“My study was done in healthy, chronic periodontitis patients with and without non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) after non-surgical periodontal treatment. The patients were reviewed from baseline 1, 3 and 6 months for serum sialic acid and periodontal clinical parameters. It was found out that there was a significant difference in the level of serum sialic acid and clinical parameters. Thus serum sialic acid could be considered as a novel biomarker in the progression of periodontitis and diabetes status.”

Biomarkers or biological markers are indicators of a medical state or certain medical signs which can be measured accurately.

Apart from these recent achievements, Drs. Keerthy and Reshma had won several accolades before.

Dr. Keerthy was awarded second place in poster presentation at SPIK conference 2012. She received the Bhatevadekar award for securing third place in scientific research paper presentation in National Periodontics PG convention held at Noida, 2013 and also came first in scientific research paper presentation in FASCEP 2013 held at Royal Dental College, Palakkad.

Dr. Reshma secured first and third prize for her poster presentations in the SPIK 2012 and 2013 conferences held at Cochin and Kottayam respectively.

Both the scholars acknowledged the support and guidance received from their Professors, Drs. Jayachandran.P, Angel Jacob, Rajesh Vylopillil, Anuradha Bhaskar, Sai Megha Menon (Department of Periodontics); Dr.Seema Kurup (Department of Oral Medicine and Radiology); Dr. Sajitha Krishnan (Department of Biochemistry) and Dr. Raja Biswas (Nanosciences & Molecular Medicine).

December 12, 2013
School of Dentistry, Kochi