# Beyond Oral Health: Personalized Strategies for Managing Oral Infections in Neutropenic Patients

## TL;DR

This paper discusses personalized strategies to manage oral infections in patients with weakened immune systems, emphasizing prevention, tailored treatment, and future research directions.

## Contribution

The paper introduces a multidisciplinary approach for managing oral infections in neutropenic patients, including personalized prevention and treatment strategies.

## Key findings

- Oral infections in neutropenic patients can progress to sepsis and require rapid treatment.
- Dental procedures can be safely performed in neutropenic patients with low complication rates.
- Future research should focus on AI for risk stratification and microbiome biomarkers for early detection.

## Abstract

Oral infections in neutropenic patients are an underestimated but likely fatal cause of infectious complications, with clinical manifestations often diminished or absent due to immune deficiency. The evaluation and management of these infections requires a personalized multidisciplinary strategy, including prevention through pre-therapy dental assessment, individualized oral hygiene protocols, and rapid treatment of dental lesions. Antimicrobial strategies should be adapted not only to the local resistance profile and individual risk, with a priority on antibiotic stewardship and rapid de-escalation when possible, but also to individual patterns of colonization and comorbidities. Dental procedures can be performed without risk in neutropenic patients with a low complication rate, but further studies are key to stratifying risk. Future research directions include the application of artificial intelligence for infectious risk stratification, the use of salivary or microbiome biomarkers for early detection, and the development of innovative technologies for targeted antimicrobial delivery. This narrative review aims to provide an overview of the common clinical manifestations in neutropenic patients and also the potential progression of dental infections into sepsis in this category of patients.