This patient was unconcerned with subtle changes in her bite until she noticed her smile in a photograph: a front tooth had drifted quite a bit, and her smile was no longer pleasing to her eye. Comparison of photographs over a ten-year period reveal a change not only at the tooth level, but also in…
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As a restorative dentist, I place equal value on predictability, longevity, comfort, biocompatibility, and aesthetics. One soap box I don’t mind stepping on is the busting down the metal-free myth about the more popular new ceramic crown options. The two most popular types of all-ceramic crowns for back teeth are made from aluminum oxide and…
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What is the JVA? The JVA or Joint Vibration Analysis machine is a small set of headphones which we place in front of the patient’s ears. But instead of the patient listening to music, this small sensor will pick up vibrations inside the patient’s jaw joint. Healthy jaw joints make very little friction as you…
Read MoreConservative dentistry and naturally sustaining lifestyles go together, and as such, many of the people attracted to our practice focus on their nutrition and overall health. This patient eats a strict raw-foods diet, including very hard foods like raw carrots and almonds. Though amalgam filling material has a compressive strength (aka, ability to resist biting…
Read MoreThis lovely 90-year-old patient has kept most of her teeth her whole life. She flosses twice daily and uses fluoride every night! One day at a luncheon with friends, she accidentally bit a salad fork, and felt two of her lower front teeth become rather loose and painful to the touch. After determining that the…
Read MoreConventional film X-rays would require chemical processing and did not have the capability of changing contrast and gain. With digital X-rays, we can see the earliest of decays, and thus treat decay conservatively. This patient was seen in our hygiene department for routine cleaning and check-up. The ultra low-radiation exposures did not initially show the…
Read MoreGeneral dentistry in the United States has been trending toward the discontinued use of silver-mercury alloy fillings, aka, amalgams. My own preference for tooth-colored resins is for several reasons, the most obvious being that as an aesthetic dentist, I like teeth to look like teeth. Additionally, resin is not affected by temperature the way metallic…
Read MoreOne of the most challenging types of “simple dentistry” is to accomplish a direct resin restoration (aka, white filling) that looks good, functions well, and seals out bacteria from re-entering the side of the tooth. Only a few years , which had been somewhat sensitive since being placed. An X-ray of the area shows where…
Read MoreThis patient had been diagnosed with Moderate OSA (Obstructive Sleep Apnea), meaning he would stop breathing in his sleep between 15-30 times an hour. His physician fitted the patient for a C-PAP but the patient did not tolerate it well, due to the leaking around the face mask. Oral exam shows two…
Read MorePeriodontal disease affects approximately 80% of adults in the USA and can show up differently across the spectrum. This patient had very little active infection evident, yet a very high susceptibility to losing the tooth attachment to the jaw bone. Visually, the teeth are very clean and the gums are a healthy light pink…
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