dentist

How to Prevent Gum Disease and Cavities

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The following is a Guest Post by Dr. Richard Mitchell who has been a dentist for over 30 years and has experience in 6 different countries. Dr. Richard Mitchell has a website with excellent dental advice at  dental-health-advice.com It’s impossible to guarantee problem-free teeth,  but you can stack the odds in your favor by following a short routine each day! FIFTEEN MINUTES A DAY. That’s all it takes to really make a difference.  Can you find 15 minutes? Here’s a bonus. You don’t have to spend those fifteen minutes in the bathroom – with a little practice,  you can do most of the work sitting on the couch watching TV! OK,  what are the things to do? First of all,  don’t worry about the brand of toothbrush.  Like Lance Armstrong said,  “it’s not the bike”.  When we’re talking about getting … Read more

16 Year Old Female Dies After Wisdom Teeth Removal

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I was very saddened to recently hear about the death on May 5, 2011, of a young 16 year old girl who was a sophomore in high school in a suburb of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She was in the ROTC program and had aspirations to join the Army. Miciah Bonzani went into cardiac arrest while under anesthesia to have her wisdom teeth removed. She was taken to a hospital, placed on life support, and then died 2 days later. She was born with a heart defect which had required two surgeries before her first birthday. What is also troubling to me about this unfortunate death is that one of the media organizations that covered the story WPXI/Pittsburgh.com, did not even mention that it occurred while having wisdom teeth extracted.  They simply called it “dental work” and an “outpatient medical procedure”, although … Read more

Patient Consultations for Wisdom Teeth Removal

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In my last post on the Well Informed Patient I discuss how Dr. Thomas B. Dodson talks about “…a new brand of well-informed patient.” In that post I attempted to make that case that many patients are not being well informed at all when it comes to wisdom teeth extractions and is partially due to the current model of informed consent in the U.S but also failure to provide their patients with current scientific evidence and information. In this post I will look specifically at 2 examples of patients who have in the past few years visited oral surgeons to discuss the possibility of having wisdom teeth removed and/or had wisdom teeth removed. From their writing one can make the case that they may have benefited from being better informed and aware of the fact that no current evidence supports … Read more

The Well Informed Patient

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In a recent editorial in the Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial surgery (vol. 69. page 1263, 2011),  titled “Shouldn’t All Clinical Research Be Scientific?”, Dr. Thomas B. Dodson,  talks to his fellow oral surgeon colleagues and says “Not only do we face rapid advances in science and technology, but we have new accountability from economic, legal, and regulatory challenges, as well as a new brand of well-informed patient.” I personally would hope that the well-informed patient are patients who are being informed by oral and maxillofacial surgeons and dentists. However, I do not believe that is really the case here. One question to ask is why patients in the past were not well informed? The other and more pressing question to ask is why are these patients still not being properly informed today? (This also applies to other doctors and … Read more

17 Year Old Female Dies After Wisdom Teeth Removal

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I was very saddened to recently hear about the death of a young 17 year old girl who was a junior in high school. The woman went into cardiac arrest while having her wisdom teeth removed. She was left in a coma and died 10 days later on April 6, 2011. She was involved in multiple choral programs and was hoping to be a professional singer. What really is upsetting to me about this is at the recent memorial service for her on April 17, 2011, her mother described the doctors calling this very unfortunate and premature death “freak.” One high school senior at the same school discussed how she was still planning to have her wisdom teeth extracted later in the week. The appropriate response should call into question the validity of extracting healthy wisdom teeth from young teenagers … Read more