A routine visit to the dentist saved Joana Breckner’s life. While in the chair 17 years ago, her dentist Phillip Sacks DDS ’70 discovered abnormal white spots on Breckner’s tongue. “They were so small, I couldn’t even see them,” said Breckner, a nonsmoker who rarely drank. Though a biopsy came back benign, Sacks and other specialists continued to monitor Breckner over the next several years. “I was very vigilant about my health,” she said. In 2007, Breckner felt something unu

Moms may want to give their children the best of everything, but a mother with oral health problems may be passing a painful legacy on to her offspring, according to researchers in New Zealand. A 27-year-long study suggests that mothers with poor oral health are likely to have children who also have poor oral health when they are adults. The study was published online in the Journal of Dental Research (Jan. 19, 2011). More than 1,000 children born in New Zealand in 1972 and 1