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Virtual live conference of solidarity—Osstem Meeting Online drives digital transition

The Osstem Meeting Online is a series of interactive online symposia, which will take place on 12 May and 4, 18 and 27 June. (Image: Osstem Implant)
Osstem Implant

Osstem Implant

Wed. 29. April 2020

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SEOUL, South Korea: On 21 April, Osstem Implant held the first session of its virtual conference, the Osstem Meeting Online, which achieved over 95,000 total live cumulative views from more than 60 countries within 2.5 hours. This series of live-streamed symposia, which create a virtual conference experience for dental professionals around the globe, will culminate in a session on 27 June that will feature a socially sustainable fundraising campaign.

The world is holding its breath in the times of the coronavirus. The COVID-19 crisis is having a profound impact on social life and poses acute economic challenges for many industries, and the dental industry is no exception. Many events, including conferences and conventions, in the field are being cancelled or postponed. Osstem Implant too has announced the postponement of its 13th annual global symposium, the 2020 Osstem World Meeting in Istanbul in Turkey, to next year.

Driving a digital transition of dental conferences

At the same time, however, by employing high technology and new technical solutions for digitalisation, Osstem Implant is taking a crucial leap towards the new era of implantology. Since 2018, Osstem Implant has already been providing dental professionals with opportunities to participate in its annual global meeting by offering live-streaming services. Based on its years of experience in digital transformation, Osstem Implant invites dental professionals around the world to an entirely virtual global conference experience this year. The Osstem Meeting Online will run until 27 June 2020, and the entire programme, including nine lectures and five live surgeries, will come alive via its own interactive live-streaming platform.

Hoping that the global situation will get better, we provide the ultimate virtual live conference experience this year, bringing dental professionals of the world closer to innovative ways of living together, Osstem Implant stated.

Knowledge transfer through real-time interaction

Whether they are at entry level and keen to learn or experienced dental professionals seeking a new challenge, attendees will find relevant standard and highly advanced live surgeries and comprehensive seminars by world-renowned speakers. Allowing the maximum knowledge transfer through real-time interaction between speakers and attendees, the first session on 21 April featured two live surgeries. Covering rare cases of implant placement in partially and completely edentulous patients aged over 70, it successfully delivered first-class implant treatment educational content to participants. All attendees had the opportunity to pose real-time questions and engage further with the speakers and other participants after the session.

Towards solidarity in dental implantology

On 27 June, the conference will celebrate its grand finale with a live surgery by Dr Marco Tallarico from Italy, and this will be combined with a socially sustainable fundraising campaign, in which the speaker, Osstem Implant and all attendees will actively participate and engage with one another. The entire amount of the fund collected will be donated to an organisation in Italy for support in overcoming the COVID-19 crisis.

Register now

Next sessions will be held on 12 May and 4, 18 and 27 June. Online registration for the Osstem Meeting Online will remain open until 27 June. More information about the meeting and registration can be found here or via the social media channels of Osstem Implant.

 

 

One thought on “Virtual live conference of solidarity—Osstem Meeting Online drives digital transition”

  1. Balakrishnan says:

    I am inerested as an osstem user

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Ancient tooth wear reveals earliest evidence of habitual drug use

An unusual pattern of tooth wear found in prehistoric human remains from Indonesia has provided a window into an ancient oral habit, linking dental damage with psychoactive plant use. (Image: Mulderphoto/Adobe Stock)

BRISBANE, Australia: Betel nut is a stimulant widely used across South and Southeast Asia and the Pacific and has long been regarded as one of the oldest psychoactive plant drugs. Until now, the earliest reliable evidence of its consumption came from dental calculus from around 3,500–3,000 years ago. A new archaeological study of human remains from Sulawesi in Indonesia has identified a previously unrecognised form of dental pathology that the researchers linked to habitual betel nut use. The findings suggest that the practice has much deeper roots than previously documented and may have begun in a form very different from modern betel chewing.

The research centres on two pre-agricultural foragers whose teeth show severe circumferential wear patterns unlike the attrition expected from normal mastication. In one individual, the third molar was substantially more worn than the second, suggesting that a hard spherical object was repeatedly held towards the back of the mouth. The second individual had similar wear affecting molars, premolars, canines and a lateral incisor.

The researchers proposed that the object was a whole, dehusked betel nut and that the wear had been caused by holding it between the teeth and sucking or gently gnawing it while moving it around the mouth. To test this explanation, they conducted chemical analysis of dental samples from both individuals. The results supported their hypothesis: arecoline, an active compound in betel nut, was detected in both individuals. Their laboratory experiments also found that intact betel nuts can release arecoline in quantities sufficient to produce physiological effects.

Prolonged use had severe dental consequences. The younger individual had exposed roots and pulp cavities and periapical lesions, and the authors suggested that the severe wear had eventually resulted in chronic infection. Both individuals had periodontal disease and tooth loss.

The chronology is particularly significant. The older individual dates to 25,000–16,000 years ago and the other to 7,600–6,300 years ago. This places betel nut use well before previously known records. The authors therefore proposed that the modern practice of betel chewing may have developed from a much older practice of sucking whole nuts.

For dental anthropology and bioarchaeology, the findings demonstrate the value of combining analysis of dental wear with biomolecular evidence to reconstruct a non-dietary oral behaviour. Their methodology was also notably minimally invasive: unlike most previous studies of this kind, the researchers extracted compounds by soaking the teeth in solvents, requiring no cutting, grinding or acid etching.

Modern betel nut use is an important oral health issue. Prolonged exposure is associated with significant oral disease, particularly an increased risk of oral cancer, and habitual chewing has also been linked to severe attrition, fractures, periodontal disease and tooth loss.

The study, titled “Betel nut sucking is the earliest recorded evidence for the habitual use of a neuroactive plant drug”, was published online on 11 September 2026 in Science Advances.

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