Not defined by her discipline

When you sit in the dental chair, does it ever occur to you that your oral health care team might identify lesions in your mouth that, left untreated, could lead to cancer? Thanks to innovator and recently elected Canadian Academy of Health Science emerging leader Dr. Leigha Rock, advances in front-line detection and treatment are being made at 9 1��Ѱ��.

DAL MAGAZINE

By: Cheryl Bell

Spring 2026 issue

Dr. Leigha Rock, director of Dal’s School of Dental Hygiene and one of five inaugural Emerging Leaders in Health Sciences in Canada, admits her educational and career path appear a bit “eclectic.” However, she says the core focus of her research has always been the same: to search for biomarkers to predict the transformation of oral pre-malignant lesions into cancer.

She began her career practising as a dental hygienist in British Columbia, saying, “My interest in this area really started there.” Dr. Rock then completed a bachelor of dental science, grad studies, a PhD in craniofacial studies, and a post-doc at BC Cancer on integrative oncology and cancer control research.

Now, Dr. Rock’s research lab, , is running clinical trials on the use of Metformin to halt the malignant progression of oral pre-cancer—important work because oral cancer is difficult to treat clinically, with surgery currently being the main form of treatment.

Pre-cancerous changes are categorized as mild, moderate, and high. Mild-grade changes are treated with surveillance. Around 15% of moderate lesion changes progress to cancer, and Dr. Rock says it’s difficult deciding which ones to treat, knowing that surgery can be damaging and life changing. “If we could figure out the difference between those lesions that progress and those that don’t,” says Dr. Rock, “that would truly inform clinical care in terms of how aggressive we should be with this group.”

A woman in a white lab coat, mask and blue gloves examines a sample in a lab.

Studying different risk predictors and biomarkers

In her research, Dr. Rock has studied many different risk predictors and biomarkers. Now she is focused on the microbiome as a potential predictor, particularly its bacteria. Dr. Rock has examined the swabbed cells of precancerous lesions that were collected up to 20 years ago and stored in a biobank, some of which developed cancer and some of which did not.

What she learned is that the bacteria in the microbiome influence the inflammatory pathways. This discovery supports a growing idea in the literature about functional redundancy within bacteria. “That means that maybe it’s not a specific species or genre, but rather a group of them,” she says.

Rock’s next step is to put her new $600,000 Canadian Institutes of Health Research catalyst grant into action. Her plan is to study the nearly 2,500 saliva samples held in a federal government repository and map the antimicrobial-resistant genes in the oral cavity. It’s a project she believes will have a wide-ranging impact on the oral health research community and on public health.

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