Willis R. Whitney, a chemist, who founded the General Electric Company laboratory once said ‘Necessity is not the mother of invention. Knowledge and experiment are its parents’ [1]. Twardowski and Misra reject the primacy of experimentation. They wish us to abandon the necessity to demonstrate by rigorous randomized trials that longer duration and/or more frequent is superior to intermittent di...

BACKGROUND Calculation of numbers needed to treat (NNT) is more complex from meta-analysis than from single trials. Treating the data as if it all came from one trial may lead to misleading results when the trial arms are imbalanced. DISCUSSION An example is shown from a published Cochrane review in which the benefit of nursing intervention for smoking cessation is shown by formal meta-analys...

Many UK patients in the search for their perfect smile have now decided to dental treatment abroad, main reasons being that they believe can same but at a much lower price. With many overseas clinics offering packages also include holiday, tourism seems an opportunity not be missed. Although always case, some treatments unfortunately do go plan, often leaving distraught and apprehensive dentist...