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Every day as clinicians, we must make decisions in the face of uncertainty. We have so many questions, and so few answers. Are there antibiotic-resistant organisms in this infection? Should I do surgery now, later, or not at all? Does this patient really need a prophylactic antibiotic? Is this really an osteomyelitis? Might this infection spread into the brain or migrate into the heart? Which antibiotic is best for this patient? Nonetheless, we must act in the present in order to protect our patient’s future. Therefore, we make rules. We accept the rules we were taught without question. They give us certainty in the face of no information. This issue of the Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Clinics of North America examines 15 questions that linger in the back of our heads as we make our daily decisions. Some of those questions have already been answered with good research, yet the knowledge is not widely appreciated. Some of these questions have not been answered by definitive research. Yet they have been explored, and we do have limited answers for them. We have attempted, to the best of our ability, to “hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted,” as Bertrand Russell said, and to examine the best available scientific evidence on the unanswered questions about the infections we treat every day.
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