Purpose: The aim of this study was to establish an objective criterion in terms of marginal bone level (MBL) to know the prognosis of an implant.Materials and Methods: A group of 176 patients in whom 590 implants were placed were included in this retrospective study. Patients older than 18 years, presenting either Kennedy class I or II edentulous section, or totally edentulous at least in one of the dental arches were included in this study. Those with any type of disturbance able to alter bone metabolism or with nontreated periodontal disease were excluded. Data on radiographic MBL at loading, 6 and 18 months later, age, gender, smoking habits, history of periodontitis, bone substratum, implant, and prosthetic features were recorded. Nonparametric receiver operating curves (ROC) were constructed for the MBL at 18 months in order to establish a distinction among high bone loser (HBL) and low bone loser (LBL) implants. Differences as a function of main variables were also determined, particularly abutment height and periodontal disease.Results: HBL implants lost at least 0.48 mm of MBL 6 months after loading; they reached at least 2 mm of MBL 18 months after loading. MBL rate followed a nonlinear trend, except in implants restored over long prosthetic abutments and in patients with history of severe periodontitis; in whom the rate of MBL over the time was nearly zero.Conclusion: Implants that lose more than 0.5 mm of marginal bone 6 months after loading are at great risk of not being radiographically successful anymore. Therefore, 0.5 mm of MBL is proposed as a distinctive and objective criterion of success in Implant Dentistry within a 6‐month follow‐up period. A prosthetic abutment height ≥2 mm resulted the most protective factor in the peri‐implant bone maintenance.

The development of oral squamous cell cancer (OSCC) is a multistep process involving the accumulation of multiple genetic alterations modulated by genetic pre-disposition and environmental influences such as tobacco and alcohol use, chronic inflammation, and viral infections. All of these factors can lead to a wide range of genetic and molecular alterations that can be detected using a range of molecular studies. The alterations mostly affect two large groups of genes: oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes, which can be either inactivated or overexpressed through mutations, loss of heterozygosity, deletions, or epigenetic modifications such as methylation. Other molecules that are closely associated with tumor pathogenesis and prognosis also exist and warrant further study. Important advances in molecular biology are helping to shed light on oral cancer and thus aiding in the early diagnosis and development of new personalized treatment approaches. The purpose of the review is to explore the genetic and molecular alterations associated with OSCC.

Background: To evaluate the relationship between the plasmatic CD63 and CAV1 positive exosome levels, in patients with OSCC before and after surgical treatment and to correlate it with their overall survival. Methods: A double-blind pilot study over 10 patients OSCC and T4 stage without distant metastases or local bone invasion has been performed. The average follow-up period was 37.64 months (34.3–40.84). We obtained 2 plasma tubes of 1 mL each before surgery and 7 days after surgery. Before performing the immunocapture-based analysis, EVs (Extracellular Vesicles) were isolated from the plasma and characterized with western blot analysis. Results: Mean values of CD63 positive plasmatic exosomes (EXO-CD63) after surgery decreased from 750.88 ± 286.67 to 541.71 ± 244.93 (p = 0.091). On the other hand, CAV-1 positive plasmatic exosomes (EXO-CAV-1) increased after surgery from 507 ± 483.39 to 1120.25 ± 1151.17 (p = 0.237). Patients with EXO-CD63 levels lower than the mean global value before the surgery had a survival of 36.04 months compared with the group with EXO-CD63 higher than the average who only survived 12.49 ± 1.67 months from the diagnosis, p = 0.225. When EXO-CAV-1 levels before surgery was lower than the average (813.94 ± 801.21) overall survival was 24.69 ± 22.23 months in contrast when it was higher that was only 11.64 months, p = 0.157. Patients with lower EXO-CD63 levels after surgery lived an average of 23.84 ± 23.9 months, while those with higher plasmatic levels of EXO-CD63 live 13.35 months, p = 0.808. When EXO-CAV-1 levels after surgery were lower, the average overall survival was 20.344 ± 15.40 months, in contrast when the EXO-CAV-1 levels were higher showing rather an estimate survival expectation of 1.64 months. Conclusions: Surgical treatment induced a dramatic reduction of the plasmatic levels of exosomes expressing CD63 as early as 1 week after resection. This first result suggests that the tumour mass is responsible of the high levels of circulating exosomes detected in cancer patients. At the same time point exosome expressing CAV-1 increased, possibly due to the inflammatory reaction immediately after surgery. Lastly, statistical analysis showed that lower levels of plasmatic exosomes both before and after surgery correlated with a better life expectancy of OSCC patients. Hopefully, this approach will prove useful in the clinical follow-up of cancer patients.

Head and neck cancer (HNC) is an ascending and agressive disease. The search for new molecular markers is emerging to solve difficulties in diagnosis, risk management, prognosis and effectiveness of treatments. Proteins related to apoptotic machinery have been identified as potential biomarkers. Caspase 3 is the main effector caspase and has a key role in apoptosis. The objective of this systematic review and meta-analysis is to review studies that analyze changes in Caspase 3 and Cleaved Caspase 3 expression both in oral premalignant disorders (OPMD) as well as in head and neck cancer (HNC). This study also proposes to review the prognostic values associated with HNC according to the expression of Caspase 3. Medline (via PubMed), EMBASE, Scopus, Cochrane, Web of Science and Grey Literature Database were screened from inception to june of 2022 and 18 studies were selected and 8 were included in the prognostic meta-analysis. Results related to the comparison of Caspase 3 expression demonstrated similar expression of Caspase 3 in HNC, with an average of 51.9% (9.5–98.1) showing high/moderate expression compared to 45.7% (14.6–84.7) in OPMD. Of interest, Cleaved Caspase 3 resulted incresed in HNC when compared with OPMD, being 73.3% (38.6–88.3) versus 22.9% (7.1–38.7). Pooled Fixed effect of HR values (95% CI) for OS related to Caspase 3 IHC expression in HNC patients was 1.48 (95% CI 0.95–2.28); also, the rate of heterogeneity was low, as revealed by I² = 31%. For DFS was 1.07 (95% CI 0.79–1.45) with I² = 0% and DSS showed a HR of 0.88 (95% CI 0.69–1.12) with I² = 37%. Caspase 3 and Cleaved Caspase 3 expression could be linked with malignancy progression, but the expression of Caspase 3 did not influence the prognosis of patients with HNC.