In Response to
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Plain Language Summary Objective: To examine mouthguard usage, hygiene practices, and oral health status of youth ice hockey players in Ontario. Design: Cross-sectional survey study. Setting: Ontario, Canada; recruitment conducted online in collaboration with the Ontario Minor Hockey Association. Participants: Youth ice hockey players in Ontario who reported mouthguard use. Interventions: Participants voluntarily completed an anonymous online questionnaire administered using REDCap. Main Outcome Measures: Frequency and consistency of mouthguard use, mouthguard cleaning practices, receipt of hygiene instructions, oral hygiene behaviors, and self-reported caries experience and oral health status. Results: Complete responses were obtained from 214 players using mouthguards. Approximately 47% reported wearing mouthguards during both games and practices, with majority (59%) wearing boil-and-bite type. Among custom mouthguard users, 64% reported never receiving care instructions from a dentist, whereas 29% of stock or boil-and-bite users reported no manufacturer guidance. Overall, 52% reported cleaning their mouthguards, and 38% of these did so after every game or practice. Most participants brushed twice daily (71%), whereas fewer flossed daily (28%). Consistent mouthguard use was associated with significantly lower odds of self-reported caries (OR = 0.49; 95% CI: 0.28-0.85). Higher motivation toward oral health was associated with positive self-rated oral health (OR = 3.45; 95% CI: 1.20-9.97). Conclusions: Youth ice hockey players in Ontario demonstrated inconsistent mouthguard use and suboptimal hygiene practices, compounded by limited guidance from dental professionals and manufacturers. Improved education, clinical engagement, and policy initiatives are needed to enhance mouthguard effectiveness and oral health outcomes among youth athletes. Plain Language SummaryThis study surveyed 214 youth ice hockey players in Ontario who use mouthguards to assess how often they wear them, how they clean them, and their oral health. Only about 47% wore mouthguards during both games and practices, and 59% used boil-and-bite types. Many received no hygiene guidance: 64% of custom users reported no care instructions from a dentist and 29% of stock or boil-and-bite users reported no manufacturer guidance. Just 52% cleaned their mouthguards, and only 38% of these did so after every use. Consistent mouthguard use was linked to lower odds of self-reported caries (OR = 0.49; 95% CI: 0.28-0.85), and higher motivation toward oral health was strongly associated with better self-rated oral health (OR = 3.45; 95% CI: 1.20-9.97). The findings highlight a need for better education, dental involvement, and policy support to improve mouthguard hygiene and oral health in youth athletes. Text is machine generated and may contain inaccuracies. FAQ
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.009 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.003 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.003 |
| Research integrity | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.930 | 0.831 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; the direct Gemma label and the distilled Codex classifier agree on what is shown here.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".