This was due to a perceived lack of need, so clearly it's important that physicians and dentists and their patients with diabetes learn that they need to focus extra attention on oral health.

Other studies have shown that patients with diabetes are significantly less likely than those without diabetes to have seen a dentist within the past year.

The problem is huge. We had four or five referrals of gestational diabetes yesterday. We're seeing probably a third more than we did seven years ago, when we started.

Dentists and parents, I think, can be very assured from the results of this study that they can continue to put silver amalgam in children's mouths to fill cavities.

We found no consensus among physicians about what is customary or appropriate. Despite efforts to standardize many aspects of the doctor-patient relationship, patients are likely to encounter very different approaches.

Boone Pickens is one of this country's greatest philanthropists, and Eugene Frenkel is one of its finest physicians, so this partnership is as appropriate as it is meaningful.