An email alert recently brought our attention to some interesting new research on the effects of fluoride. Analyzing NHANES data, its author mapped out trends in caries (tooth decay), oral health related quality of life, and fluorosis among kids. Fluorosis is the result of too much fluoride. The teeth become spottily discolored and pitted. In […]
Dental Health
Have Dentists Come Down Too Hard on Dried Fruit?
What did Dr. Glaros learn in dental school that seems as true four decades later as it did back then? Here it is: “Avoid retentive, fermentable carbohydrates!” In other words, don’t eat the sticky, sugary stuff. “But what if it’s natural?” some folks might ask. Let’s look at fruit juice, for instance. It’s certainly natural […]
A New Must-Read: The Case Against Sugar
You’ve got to read Gary Taubes’ new book, The Case Against Sugar. As the title suggests, Taubes’ purpose is to present the case against sugar – both sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup – as the principal cause of the chronic diseases that are most likely to kill us, or at least accelerate our demise, in […]
Breastfeeding Causes Cavities? Actually, It May Protect Against Decay
There are plenty of reasons why breastfeeding matters, starting with the basic fact that it’s naturally our first food. Just as we weren’t designed to eat the hyper-processed junk that gets passed off as food in your local grocery store, we weren’t designed to thrive on manufactured formula and pap through our first years of […]
Enjoy Your Holiday Desserts with Your Dentist’s Blessing
Candy canes. Cookies. Fruitcake. Fudge. Mulled cider or wine. Egg nog. All of the most conspicuous traditional holiday treats seem to be sugar bombs. Yet who can imagine the holiday season without them? It just wouldn’t feel like Christmas – or any of the other winter holidays and observations – without the traditional foods we […]
It’s Beyond Time to Address the Root Cause of Tooth Decay
At their recent meeting, the ADA made a big to-do over the 70th anniversary of fluoridation. “This is the most effective weapon in dentistry, I believe, to prevent not only tooth decay but mouth disease in general and overall health,” stated Raymond Gist, DDS, past ADA president, in a press release. Quite a claim about […]
“Very Little Contemporary Evidence” Supporting Water Fluoridation, Says New Review of the Science
Just because you say something is so doesn’t make it true. It doesn’t make mercury dental amalgam safe. It doesn’t make root canal teeth sterile and inert. And it certainly doesn’t make fluoridation an effective practice for preventing caries. The sore lack of evidence supporting fluoridation was brought into the foreground again with last week’s […]
The Amino Acid that Protects Your Teeth
Meet dental biofilm: It’s the sticky goo that bacteria and other microbes form as they colonize on the enamel of your teeth. They learn how to work together and protect each other for the sake of helping the group go on. When you brush and floss, you destroy these colonies. But tenacious little critters that […]