Santiago Vivallo, DDS

At a glance

Chilean citizen, eligible for the H-1B1 work visa. U.S. Social Security Number. Lived in New York for three months in 2026; two Work and Travel seasons in the U.S. (2021-2023, New Hampshire and California).

My path

1. 2017

   Dentistry begins, Universidad del Desarrollo (full merit scholarship)

2. 2019

   Business Administration begins

3. 2020

   Undergraduate thesis: digital vs conventional dental impressions

4. 2022

   Six-month public primary care internship · Master in Healthcare Management and Public Health begins

5. 2023

   First place, Latin American oral radiology congress · Internship at Chile's National Health Fund

6. 2024

   RedSalud: Digital Clinical Trainer, then Dental Project Coordinator · DentRead founded

7. 2025

   Poster accepted at the World Congress of Dentomaxillofacial Radiology, London

8. 2026

   Salivary biomarkers review · AI radiograph study with Universidad del Desarrollo · New York programs

Research

1. 2026

   From the Mouth to Systemic Health: Salivary Biomarkers and New Frontiers in Non-Invasive Diagnosis

   First author, with Sebastián Vásquez · Poster, 1st Dentistry Research Summit, Universidad del Desarrollo · Manuscript in preparation

2. 2026

   Diagnostic validation and retraining of an artificial intelligence model for dental caries detection in intraoral and panoramic radiographs

   Principal investigator · Universidad del Desarrollo, Faculty of Medicine Clínica Alemana · Submitted to the Scientific Ethics Committee, March 2026

3. 2025

   Generative deep learning models for synthetic dental radiographs in oral radiology

   First author · Poster accepted, World Congress of the International Association of DentoMaxilloFacial Radiology, London

4. 2023

   Applications of Artificial Intelligence in Oral and Maxillofacial Radiology: a Literature Review

   First author (Vivallo S, Briner J, Piña M, Kusch AM) · Published in the Yearbook of the Chilean Society of Oral and Maxillofacial Radiology, 2023;26:36-38 · First place, research competition, Latin American Congress of Dentomaxillofacial Radiology (ALARID) 2023

5. 2020

   Digital Dentistry: Digital vs Conventional Impression Techniques. A Literature Review

   Undergraduate thesis · Universidad del Desarrollo Science and Innovation Fair 2020 (certified)

   

From the Mouth to Systemic Health

Salivary biomarkers and new frontiers in non-invasive diagnosis

Santiago Vivallo, Sebastián Vásquez · 1st Dentistry Research Summit, Universidad del Desarrollo, October 2026

Which salivary biomarkers have moved beyond biological association toward diagnostic accuracy and real clinical use?

Status: review being finalized for publication. Screening is being validated by two independent reviewers.

Review of systematic reviews and meta-analyses published Oct 2021 - Oct 2026. Quality appraised with a standard tool for systematic reviews (AMSTAR 2); overlap between reviews measured.

From association to clinical usefulness

Gum disease (periodontitis)

A leading saliva test (aMMP-8) is not sensitive enough to replace the clinical exam.

Diabetes

Evidence does not support replacing blood glucose with saliva.

Oral cancer

Not enough evidence yet for routine use of saliva tests.

Common barriers

How samples are collected and handled varies; few external validations.

Evaluate each use case, standardize collection, prove clinical benefit.

Poster companion site

Manuscript in preparation; independent double review in progress.

Validating AI on dental radiographs

Principal investigator · Universidad del Desarrollo, Faculty of Medicine Clínica Alemana

Diagnostic validation and retraining of an artificial intelligence model for dental caries detection in intraoral and panoramic radiographs

Design

Retrospective, non-experimental study of anonymized institutional radiographs and their prior radiology reports. No patient contact.

Aim

Measure how accurately the model detects caries compared with the radiology reports, then retrain it with local anonymized data.

Ethics and compliance

Submitted to the Scientific Ethics Committee (March 2026) with confidentiality, conflict-of-interest and consent-waiver documents. Good Clinical Practice certificate (ICH E6(R3), The Global Health Network, June 2026) completed for this study.

Leading a 46-clinic digital rollout

RedSalud, National Dental Directorate, Chile · Digital Clinical Trainer (May-Aug 2024), then Dental Project and Digitalization Coordinator (Aug 2024 - present)

Situation

RedSalud was moving its 46 dental clinics from analog to digital workflows with intraoral scanners and digital laboratories.

Task

Get at least 80% of dentists trained and move clinics, in phases, to sending lab work digitally.

Action

Coordinated five areas (clinical operations, medical equipment, IT infrastructure and networks, dental specialties and laboratories, clinic directors); built the training calendar and verification with each clinic director; set performance indicators and progress reports.

Result

Training coverage rose from 82% to 96% in three months (23 clinics at 100% by July 2024) and today every dentist in the network is trained.

Managing new clinical technology projects

Each project: define requirements, align clinical, operations and IT teams, pilot, train, measure.

Intraoral scanner implementation

Network-wide rollout, from installation to mandatory digital cases.

Dentalink clinical software

Requirements and testing of new developments, including scanner integration.

Nitrous oxide sedation

Pilot implementation.

Computer-guided implant surgery

Pilot implementation.

Teledentistry pre-evaluation

Pilot.

Building DentRead

CEO and co-founder, Dec 2024 - present · AI-assisted reading of dental radiographs

Situation

Dental radiographs are read under time pressure and findings are easy to miss.

Task

Build a radiograph-reading assistant and validate it clinically.

Action

Led clinical validation and data strategy, pilots with public and private dental organizations, and grant applications.

Result

Funded by Chile's economic development agency (CORFO): Seed Capital 2024 and Innova Región Biobío 2026 (awarded October 2026); validation study with Universidad del Desarrollo underway.

Programs and pitches, 2026

AI Nexus, New York

Accelerator by C10 Labs and New York City Economic Development Corporation. DentRead selected, 13 of 143 applicants; presented at the "Built in NYC" Demo Day, Civic Hall.

Harvard Business School Foundry

DeepTech Startup Bootcamp. Accepted to validate the U.S. market.

Global Hub for Future Dentistry, The University of Hong Kong

DentRead accepted in 2026.

MedTech Ahead, Boston

Startup pitch competition hosted at Smith+Nephew. DentRead pitched (June 2026).

New York Tech Week

Pitched at Biolabs@NYU Langone with C10 Labs.

1752vc Ignite Startup Academy

Startup program, 2026.

Public health and health financing

Chile's National Health Fund (FONASA), Commercial Management, Nov 2023 - Jan 2024 (Business Administration internship): prepared agreements with private providers, reviewed hospital cases by diagnosis group, produced the department's statistics reports.

Public primary care center, Cobquecura, May - Oct 2022 (dental internship, 720 hours): prevention and health promotion; coordinated radiology equipment and scheduled and emergency radiographs.

Education: Master in Healthcare Management and Public Health specialization, Universidad del Desarrollo (2022-2024).

Where I can add value

How I would start

An approach, to adapt to your team's structure and plans for the year.

Listen and learn

The multi-specialty team, current protocols and how clinical data is captured today.

Support and standardize

Help make data collection consistent and well documented, where the team needs it.

Contribute to research

Support ongoing studies, literature reviews and abstracts.

Thank you

Oral health is systemic health.

Also: U.S. Dental Market Landscape, an 8-slide analysis of dental software and AI (2026).