Contrary to what your dentist may tell you, you CAN reverse tooth decay, new research finds

A recent study brings good news to people who have a sweet tooth and those who neglect to properly brush their teeth. Scientists were able to discover that teeth have the ability to reverse tooth decay; meaning, traces of such tooth damage can be totally gone, thus doing away with the necessity to undergo oral surgeries or have tooth fillings.

What would this miracle entail? Simple, researchers said. Just take a single aspirin.

“Our initial research findings in the laboratory suggest that the use of aspirin, a drug already licensed for human use, could offer an immediate innovative solution enabling our teeth to repair themselves,” principal investigator, Professor Ikhlas El Karim, a senior lecturer in the School of Medicine, Dentistry and Biomedical Sciences at Queen’s University Belfast (QUB), said.

“Ideally, what we’re reporting here is that we’re hoping to be able to develop a therapy [so] that the teeth could repair themselves,” Karim added. (Related: Stop gum pain and tooth decay with sustainable dentistry.)

What the researchers did was collate previous research data to be able to point to aspirin as a compound that can induce the gene signature that is needed to make new dentine. Having done so, the QUB scientists treated stem cells in a Petri dish and identified “genetic and also material evidence that it can produce dentine”.

“The next step is to go and try and figure out how you are going to apply the aspirin to the teeth, to regenerate the dentine, and to replace the need for fillings. You need to put it [on the tooth] in a way that bit can be easily released over a long period of time, if you put an aspirin now on a cavity, it’s going to be washed away.

We are not encouraging that, there is a scientific way to go about this, so that we produce a final product that can be used by a dentist, not by a patient. The next step is to work with our pharmacy colleagues to try to develop a vehicle to put it in to the teeth, after the clinical trials,” Karim said.

The fact that aspirin is already a commercially-manufactured product is a boon to the dental industry’s longing to have this endeavor materialize.

“We are not really talking about 10 or 20 years time, it will probably be in the near future that it could be tried in a clinical trial with patients. This novel approach could not only increase the long-term survival of teeth, but could also result in huge savings for the [National Health Service] and other healthcare systems worldwide,” Karim concluded.

Aspirin, which is also called acetylsalicylic acid, is a drug that has been popular for many years now as an effective painkiller. It has anti-inflammatory properties, and is used to soothe headaches, menstrual cramps, and muscle pain. People can get it for merely a penny a tablet.

According to recent data, tooth decay is one among the most common tooth ailments in the world today; it affects a third of adults the world over. Also, it is the number one problem in the teeth of children who are residing in the United Kingdom.

Tooth decay happens when oral acids dissolve the enamel and dentine of the teeth, causing black holes or cavities to form within, around, or on the teeth. The oral acids are caused by bacteria that are found within the plaque – a sticky and thin film – that gets deposited in and around our teeth.

Fillings are usually used to prevent bacteria from totally ruining a single tooth by hindering the cavity from reaching the tooth’s most critical component: the pulp.

Normally, our teeth do not recuperate from the onset of cavities. If worse comes to worst, they can produce a thin band of dentine – the layer just below the enamel – if the inner dental pulp becomes exposed, but other than that they can do nothing: a large cavity cannot possibly be repaired.

Read up on more stories such as this one at Dentistry.news.

Sources include:

DailyMail.co.uk

BBC.com

Mother reported to child services for “oral neglect” for switching child’s dentist

There are a number of things that could get you a visit from child protective services. Forgetting to feed your kids for three days straight, for example, would undoubtedly result in the CPS knocking on your front door. The same goes for doing physical harm to your children and just generally not carrying out your responsibilities as a caring, nurturing parent. You would never expect, however, that child protective services would get involved for something as simple as switching your kid’s dentist, but for one mother in Canada, that’s exactly what happened.

When Melissa Lopez decided to go to a second dentist to get another opinion regarding her daughter’s teeth, she never expected that she would be reported to a social services agency. Much to her surprise, Melissa found herself reported for what was considered to be “oral neglect.”

“For someone to turn around and try to accuse me of neglecting her, its absurd,” she told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. “I couldn’t believe it.”

Indeed, based on what we already know about the situation, it does seem unnecessary and even a bit silly for social services to have gotten involved. The first dentist that Melissa Lopez took her daughter Elianna to informed her that Elianna had nine cavities, which meant that Melissa would have to spend thousands of dollars to get them fixed.

When Melissa found herself becoming a bit skeptical about how much work she had been told had to be done on her daughter’s teeth, she decided to go to a second dentist to get another opinion. The second dentist told her that Elianna didn’t need as much dental work as the previous dentist had originally told her, so Melissa decided to go there.

When Melissa forgot to contact the first dentist’s office and tell them that she was going with someone else for her daughter’s dental work, the first dentist decided to call the Children’s Aid Society (CAS), who then informed Melissa that she was under investigation for “oral neglect.” Even though Melissa provided the CAS with proof that she had in fact gotten her daughter the dental care that she needed, her name will still be on file for the rest of her life. (Related: Pediatrician calls child protective services on mother for refusing to vaccinate her child.)

“It will always be there, 10, 15, 20 years from now,” Melissa said of the CAS’s file they now have on her. “I’m red-flagged, I’ve been marked, and there’s no reason for this to have happened.”

As ridiculous as all of this sounds, it is worth noting that the dentist who reported Melissa was simply complying with the law. According to Kevin Marsh, the director of the Royal College of Dental Surgeons of Ontario, The Child and Family Services Act requires that everyone in the healthcare field get in touch with the Children’s Aid Society if they suspect that some form of abuse or neglect is happening. (Related: Will your child be removed from home for refusing vaccines?)

“Health-care professionals and other people who work closely with children have a special responsibility under the act,” Marsh said in an interview with CBC. Melissa, however, disagrees with the CAS getting involved, and still feels as though she did nothing wrong.

“I would absolutely love it if they would just remove that file for me, because I don’t feel there was any just reason to report me in the first place,” she said. “As a mother, you pride yourself on how you raise your kids. I have three kids – they’re healthy, they’re happy, they do great in school, they have lots of friends,” Melissa continued. “For someone to turn around and try to accuse me of neglecting her, it’s absurd.”

To be fair, Melissa did have a responsibility to contact the first dentist and inform him that they were switching to someone else, but on the flip side, it wouldn’t have been difficult for the first dentist to reach out to Melissa before contacting CAS either.

Sources include:

OffTheGridNews.com

NewsTread.com

War on weed: Cannabis can make your teeth fall out, claims ridiculous study

Though it remains illegal at the federal level, a total of 29 states and the District of Columbia have now passed laws allowing for the medicinal use of marijuana. Eight of these, including D.C., have adopted even broader laws, allowing for the legal use of recreational marijuana. There are, of course, many who are unhappy with this turn of events, and who would like to vilify marijuana in the eyes of the public by using scare tactics to undermine its myriad health benefits. One such tactic is to convince people that if they use marijuana they will get gum disease and their teeth will fall out.

A study that would appear to reinforce this idea was performed by researchers from Columbia University. The research team analyzed information supplied by 1,938 participants in the Centers for Disease Control’s 2011/2012 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, to determine the effects of regular recreational cannabis use on teeth. Twenty-seven percent of participants reported using marijuana at least once in the preceding 12-month period.

The researchers were able to determine how many of the study participants had developed gum disease by measuring the spaces between their teeth and the surrounding gum area. Since healthy gums have no more than 3mm between the tooth and the gum, gaps larger than that are a reliable indicator of the presence of periodontal disease.

The study, which was published in the journal Periodontology, concluded that the participants who had reported using recreational marijuana frequently were at greater risk of developing moderate or even severe gum disease.

“Even controlling for other factors linked to gum disease, such as cigarette smoking, frequent recreational cannabis smokers are twice as likely as non-frequent users to have signs of periodontal disease,” said study author Dr. Jaffer Shariff.

Now, before you go throwing away your medical marijuana or hauling out the plants in your backyard, it is important to look at why there is a link between increased marijuana use and gum disease. [Stay up-to-date with the latest developments at Dentistry.news]

Livestrong explains the connection. Marijuana, whether smoked or consumed in another way, affects the nervous system in a way that reduces the amount of saliva in the mouth, which can result in a condition called xerostomia, or dry mouth. This lack of saliva can lead to bad breath and other issues, because saliva is needed to wash away bacteria and food from the teeth and gums. If left untreated, this could result in tooth decay and possible tooth loss. This excess of bacteria in the mouth can also result in gum disease, which again, without treatment, could result in tooth loss. Marijuana smokers should also be aware that excessive smoking, especially in combination with tobacco use, can increase their risk of developing oral cancer.

Ian Hamilton, a cannabis researcher with the University of York, explains that it is a lack of the necessary dental hygiene and care that can result in oral issues for marijuana users.

“[P]eople who use cannabis are less likely to brush their teeth or visit a dentist regularly, both factors can contribute to gum disease. In addition a combination of reduced saliva excretion and increased appetite commonly referred to as the ‘munchies’ are also important aspects which are thought to play a part in the increased risk of gum disease for people who smoke cannabis.”

It is, therefore, vitally important that marijuana users be made aware of the connection between poor oral hygiene and gum disease. They need to be conscious of rinsing their mouths out more often than usual to make sure they get rid of bacteria and food in their mouths. It would also be a good idea for them to visit a holistic dentist regularly and take other preventative steps to stay ahead of potential dental issues.

Sources:

DailyMail.co.uk

Livestrong.com

Governing.com

Is pine tree bark the key to healthier, stronger teeth?

 Good news for the 80 percent of us who have resin tooth fillings: a new extract can delay our dentist trips by years. Pine tree bark extract is shown to alter the chemical structure of our teeth, strengthening them, and allowing our fillings to bind to them better. This is achieved due to the compounds in the extract that strengthen dentine, the tissue layer beneath the enamel of the teeth.

Dr. Guido Pauli of the University of Illinois at Chicago says the “weak link in the chain of bonding is the interface between the resin and the dentine. We have clear evidence that our intervention materials change this interface much to the better.” Dr. Pauli is referring to his recent tests that suggest the tree bark extracts can strengthen dentine by as much as ten times. Considering the current lifespan of a resin tooth filling, these new findings suggest a ten-year extension.

Dr. Pauli, and his colleague Dr. Ana Bedran Russo, reached this conclusion after testing the extracts of the Chinese red pine, otherwise known as pinus massoniana. The extract was applied to human molars before examining how they deformed when introduced to various heavy forces. Dr. Pauli and Dr. Russo saw that pine bark extracts strengthened the dentine in teeth, which remained coated on the molars even a year after application. The authors also found that the dentine structure changed after being exposed to pine bark extract. Dentine was more compatible with the resin fillings, binding to them more tightly. “Extract-treated dentine show superior binding to resin fillings,” says Dr. Pauli.

Dr. Pauli is currently working on producing a refined extract that dentists can use on teeth after drilling, to strengthen bonding to the filling. However, he quickly adds, “we are not envisioning a pure compound; the chemistry is too complex.”

The results of this study are published in the Journal of Organic Chemistry.

The implication of these findings

Old dental practices saw people filling cracks in their teeth with metal. This led to the laughable but entirely factual phrase of “metal mouth.” Advancing technologies developed resin-type fillings, which were able to mimic the teeth’s natural color, and were generally safer than their metal counterparts. Still, resin tends to deteriorate after a few years. Replacing these dental fillings would need more drilling, costing healthy dental tissue.

Dentine is the calcified extracellular tissue of the teeth located just below the hard external enamel. “Resins have to bind to the dentin, and that interface is the weak point. This is why the restorations don’t last,” warns Dr. Pauli. By developing this natural preventive measure, it is hoped that people will be able to reduce the number of trips they make to the dentist. Furthermore, the pine bark extract would strengthen tooth tissue, promoting overall health.

Head of the Oral Health Foundation, Dr. Nigel Carter supplements this by saying that “fillings are susceptible to wear-and-tear and can occasionally be in need of repair and replacement. Having fillings which have a longer lifespan could be more comforting to the patient, as the procedure will have to be carried out less often.”

Dannel Ferrira of the University of Mississippi says that Dr. Pauli’s research is “a totally unexpected and novel application. It is really an important breakthrough.” (RELATED: Follow more news on holistic dentistry at HolisticDentistry.news.)

Some other facts to consider

It is estimated that 80 percent of the American population has dental fillings. These are standard restorative dentistry treatments meant to repair minimal tooth decay or fractures. These dental fillings can even improve bite.

Enamel loss is the main reason for tooth decay, leading to an increased sensitivity. This can cause relatively painful sensations. Tooth sensitivity caused by enamel loss is typically treated with a dental filling.

Sources:

DailyMail.co.uk

CEN.ACS.org