Wisdom Teeth

Animals Have Room for Wisdom Teeth

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An article recently posted by Popular Science http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2009-08/do-animals-have-wisdom-teeth suggests that animals have room for wisdom teeth. An evolutionary biologist named Leslea Hlusko of the University of California, Berkeley, suggests that the shape of your jaw is partially determined by what you eat when you are growing up. Since unlike animals, humans cook all the meat they eat usually and do not just tear it off raw, jaws have become smaller in size. The article also suggests that if you eat a lot of raw carrots and other tubers as a child this may help to make the jaw larger when you get older and thus better accomedate your wisdom teeth so the wisdom teeth do not have to be removed.

Wisdom Teeth and Dentist Culture

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I found an interesting article today on how the “Culture of research led to changes in extraction of wisdom teeth.” The article addressed wisdom teeth removal surgery in the United Kingdom (UK) and how this has changed over time. An interesting tidbit is there were 130,000 surgical extraction procedures conducted in England and Wales in 1995.  By 2002, this number had fallen to less than 60,000. The reason was because of research and learning from evidence. There is no benefit to extracting  healthy impacted wisdom teeth since the procedure caries the risk of damage to facial nerves. It is unfortunate that a similar policy has not been implemented in the United States. On a lighter note, another website discusses deranged dentist names. It is not exactly clear were some of the readers are from, however, some of them are amusing. … Read more

Oral Surgeon Sexual Assault Acquittal

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Last month I reported on sexual assault and how it has crept up into some oral surgeons offices during wisdom teeth removal. Well, recently there was another sexual assault case against an oral surgeon in the courts. Dr. Robert J. Boyda was accused of sexual assault by 17 women who testified as such in trial. However, the judge determined that he believed the women “thought” they were sexually assaulted due to the drugs that they were on. One of the drugs was stated to have “sexual hallucinations” in rare cases. The drug in question is propofol. I question whether or not you can really test if a sexual hallucination is a side effect in rare cases. You would certainly need an honest surgeon. This of course raises the issue of whether or not you should have anesthesia when you undergo … Read more

Treating Gum Disease Helps Rheumatoid Arthritis

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Researchers from the Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine and University Hospitals of Cleveland recently reported that people who cure their gum disease can decreased their arthritic pain if they surrfer from rheumatoid arthritis. “It was exciting to find that if we eliminated the infection and inflammation in the gums, then patients with a severe kind of active rheumatoid arthritis reported improvement on the signs and symptoms of that disease,” said Nabil Bissada, D.D.S. According to Ali Askari, M.D., chair of the department of rheumatology at University Hospitals, “From way back, rheumatologists and other clinicians have been perplexed by the myth that gum disease may have a big role in causing systematic disease.” Askari and Bissada are part of a team of researchers that studied 40 patients with  periodontal disease and a severe form of rheumatoid arthritis. The … Read more

Wisdom Tooth Extraction Video

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The following is a video provided by PBHS Inc,. which is the same company featured in the previous post. While they may engage in practices that promote oral surgeons to all use nearly the exact same content about dentistry, oral surgery, wisdom teeth, and other procedures on their websites, they also do provide decent content. This video talks about the process of getting your wisdom teeth out. Of course they fail to mention that your oral surgeon or one you are considering does not have to mention legally all of the possible complications that could arise from the surgery. Only the more prevalent complications and life-threatening ones are essential and must be mentioned before any procedure such as wisdom teeth removal.