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Background: Research has demonstrated that the loss of one or more natural teeth can be an emotionally traumatic experience that mirrors processes associated with bereavement. There remains scant literature examining the role of emotions in dental encounters. One such exception is the literature on the idea of the 'treatment alliance' in dental encounters. The aim of this paper is to explore the role of the 'treatment alliance' in dentist–patient encounters. Methods: Data were collected from clinical observations, semi-structured interviews and focus groups exploring the experience of tooth loss and how the treatment alliance shaped the patient journey. Data analysis was conducted using the grounded theory method influenced by phenomenology. Coding was conducted using NVIVO and the unit of analysis was the treatment alliance. Results: Twenty participants took part in the interviews (eleven male; nine female; 22–86 years; mean age = 58.9 years). Observations were carried out with a further fourteen participants (seven male; seven female; 50–101 years; mean age = 62.2 years). The paper draws on four cases taken from the observational data to illustrate important dynamics underpinning how the treatment alliance varied. These case studies are then used as the basis for a critical discussion of the importance of the treatment alliance in dentistry. Conclusions: The treatment alliance acted as an important moderator in the clinical encounter, helping to influence successful outcomes. An important foundational component of the treatment alliance was the degree of emotional work the dental team conducted when 'getting to know' unfamiliar patients. Whilst emotions were an important factor in dental encounters, their acknowledgement and management were not essential to all successful outcomes. Much more research is therefore needed into the role of emotional labour in dental encounters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While previous sociological research on oral health has identified the relevance of personal relationships, there is more scope to analyse the mouth through a lens of connectedness. Recent qualitative interviews with 43 older people (65+) in England and Scotland found that participants constructed relational narratives to make sense of their oral health practices. By drawing on ideas of family practices, family display and personal life, we illustrate how the mouth can be understood relationally. Participants presented their own embodied experiences as connected to the actions of their parents. Narratives also reflected how, as parents and grandparents themselves, participants tried to shape the experiences of others. In this way, oral health practices were conceptualised as being about family. This can be seen in self‐narratives that demonstrated how participants located themselves as embedded in webs of ongoing relationships. We highlight the importance of narrated practices of thinking and feeling, whereby participants imagined doing oral health, and indeed family, in different ways. We thereby demonstrate how oral health practices are constituted through family connectedness and at the same time how these practices contribute to the constitution of family. Policy should therefore pay attention to family relations when promoting improvements in oral health practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to add to the literature on the sociology of oral health and dentistry by presenting the relevance of status passage to the study of complete tooth loss. The article reports on an analysis of data taken from participants residing in the Nelson region of New Zealand. In total the data include interviews from 20 participants, all of whom had their remaining natural teeth removed before 1960. In total, 12 women and eight men were interviewed. All were from a European background with an age range of 71 to 101 years. Following a narrative approach, participants were interviewed on the nature of the social factors that resulted in complete tooth loss by starting with their family history and then focusing on the factors and events leading up to their total tooth loss. Data were analysed using the methods and techniques of grounded theory. This article provides an outline of the importance of scheduling, prescribing, social factors, 'compound awareness contexts' and reversibility to the status passage into complete tooth loss. We conclude by arguing that the theory of status passage may enable a detailed analysis of the 'time-space extensionality' of trajectories into complete tooth loss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]