Internationally acknowledged expert becomes Endowed Professor for Preventive Dentistry

Preventive dental medicine focuses on the causes, development, diagnosis and treatment of diseases that affect the oral cavity and the teeth. It has the objective of maintaining and improving the oral health of the public. That includes, for example, improving the dental care of the elderly as well as oral hygiene training for migrants, for whom daily dental care is not part of their daily routine. To this end, preventive dental medicine relates to and includes the patients as well as the health policy, the schools, the dentists and the dental staff.

In 2016, the non-profit Lutz-Zürrer Foundation for the Promotion of Preventive Dentistry endowed the dental clinics at the University of Bern with a professorship for preventive dental medicine and oral epidemiology. It has initially been established for ten years with total funding of 4 million Francs. Starting from February 1st, the Executive Board of the university has appointed Guglielmo Campus to the position of "Ausserordentlicher Professor für Präventivzahnmedizin und Orale Epidemiologie" (Associate Professor for Preventive Dentistry and Oral Epidemiology).

Supporting healthy behavior from an early stage

Guglielmo Campus completed his training at the Dental School of the University of Sassari in Italy. He has been Associate Professor for Community Dentistry, Cariology and Paediatric Dentistry at the University of Sassari since 2014. He is also Coordinator of the Italian WHO Collaborating Center for Epidemiology and Community Dentistry. For the WHO Collaborating Center, he develops and coordinates measures which have the objective of assessing the oral health of the public in Italy as well as other countries such as Mexico and Burkina Faso. He also develops strategies and recommends measures with the purpose of encouraging healthy behavior starting from childhood, including a reduced consumption of sugar, stricter controls on tobacco and affordable fluoride toothpaste.

Campus is a member of the Research Board within the Italian Ministry for Health for the realization of the Italian National Guidelines for Caries Prevention and the Clinical Recommendations in Pediatric Dentistry. He is the author of more than 180 scientific papers covering the topics of oral epidemiology, preventive dentistry, cariology and pediatric dentistry.

"With Guglielmo Campus, we have appointed an internationally, highly experienced and well-networked expert for preventive dentistry," stated Christian Leumann, Rector of the University of Bern. This will also be of benefit to the prevention of dental diseases in Switzerland, explained Thomas Imfeld, President of the Lutz-Zürrer Foundation: "Through his work for WHO and the Italian Ministry of Health, Campus has in-depth knowledge of the epidemiological possibilities regarding the epidemiological study of as well as the preventive measures for advancing the oral health of the public." Hendrik Meyer-Lückel, Director of the Clinic for Restorative, Preventive and Pediatric Dentistry said: "With Campus, we are looking forward to further developing the high standard of dental prevention in our teaching, at the clinical level and in our research, and to contributing to the dental health of the public."