A specialty of dentistry that deals with the community and its aggregate dental or oral health rather than that of the individual patient. It focuses on social oral health policies and investigates the pattern, causes and control of diseases of the oral cavity among various groups of people ie. Dental epidemiology. It deals with preventing dental diseases, prolonging life & promoting physical & mental efficiency through organized dental community efforts for the sanitation of the environment, the control of communicable infections, the education of individual in personal hygiene, the organization of medical & nursing services for the early diagnosis & preventive treatment of oral disease.