Spotlight on Jeanne McDaniel, MS Nutrition

Jeanne McDaniel from The Nutrition Source visited our team today for a lunch-n-learn.  In her presentation, we learned about the relationship between diet choices and nutrition, gut bacteria, and absorption of minerals.  Did you know that Magnesium (Mg2+) is the fourth most abundant mineral in our bodies?  It is helpful in management of blood pressure…

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Smile balancing through functional tooth reshaping

According to Gordon Christensen, dental equilibration (bite balancing) might be one of the most widely UNDER-utilized services in dentistry. – JADA April 2005 136(4): 497–499; Teeth that fit together correctly do not require the additional muscular activity needed to shift the jaw to the side or squeeze unilaterally when one side hits first.  The art of…

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Accidental fork bite threatens lower teeth

This 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…

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Early decay visible with enhanced Digital X-rays

Conventional 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…

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Decay under amalgam filling is typical

General 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…

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