Katharine "Kate" Ciarrocca, DMD, MSEd

As an advocate of the essential role oral health plays in overall health, I have spent my career as a dentist and oral medicine specialist in a setting where oral health care is integral to overall patient care. My practice has focused on medically complex patients and how that complexity affects the oral cavity. I am the director of Duke Oral Medicine and Hospital Dentistry. We diagnose and treat acute and chronic oral complications of head and neck radiation therapy, chemotherapy, bisphosphonate treatment, solid organ transplant, bone marrow transplant, and cardiac surgery. Our service can also diagnose and treat oral lesions due to medical illness (herpes, yeast, canker sores), oral mucosal diseases (lichen planus, pemphigus, pemphigoid), oral ramifications of cancer treatment (mucositis, GVHD, osteoradionecrosis, dry mouth, trismus, radiation caries), autoimmune diseases (Sjogren’s, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, scleroderma), and dry mouth related to medical illness/treatment.