Not a good scenario, right?

Well, if you are one of the million people who has one or more amalgam fillings, chances are, you are ingesting mercury right now as we speak.

According to some studies, there is evidence that mercury continually leaches from amalgam fillings at a rate of about 10-50 times the safe limit (0.28 microgram/day) set by the US Public Health Service.

As a dental patient, you should know that Amalgam contains mercury; and mercury toxicity has been linked to birth defects, multiple sclerosis, fatigue, Alzheimer’s disease, Autism, ADHD, depression, anxiety, reduced immune function, antibiotic resistance, and impaired kidney function. It is also a potent killer of white blood cells and that proper removal of amalgam fillings will restore white blood cell counts to healthy levels. There is also evidence that the number of T-cells (an important part of immune defenses) decreases substantially when amalgam fillings are placed in the mouth, but increases again once the fillings are removed.
So how does the mercury leak into your body?  

Many studies have found that chewing releases the mercury from your amalgam fillings.  The mercury vapors released easily end up in the pituitary glands in your brain.  Autopsies performed in the Karolinska Institute in Sweden found out that cadavers who have amalgam fillings has 3 times more mercury in the brain and 9 times more in the kidneys compared to cadavers without amalgam fillings (We ingest and inhale mercury everyday from the foods we eat and from the polluted air we breathe).

The common bacteria found in our mouth and intestines convert mercury into methylmercury, a compound that is 100x more toxic than the elemental mercury. Methylmercury easily passes the blood-brain barrier as well as the placental barriers.  Therefore, several governments around the world prohibit dentists from placing amalgam fillings on pregnant women.

Mercury is also linked to heart diseases, trigeminal neuralgia, psychiatric symptoms (and in very low concentrations) like depression and irritability; chronic fatigue, kidney damage and hearing loss.

There’s no doubt in our mind that amalgam fillings pose serious threat to our health whether we show symptoms of mercury toxicity or not.  Therefore, our dental clinic in Makati maintains a “Mercury-free” practice.

Now, if you are a health card holder, you are entitled to free amalgam fillings according to the amount you pay the health card company.  Amalgam fillings are very cheap and easy to place in teeth.  But as an educated patient knowing the hazards of having amalgam fillings, would you choose convenience over your health?

For your health’s sake, have those old amalgam fillings replaced now.

Here’s an interesting fact, though:  the American Dental Association maintains that amalgam fillings are safe; contrary to the declaration of the EPA or the Environmental Protection Agency that amalgam is considered a hazardous material!  However, when the ADA was faced with a lawsuit regarding the use of amalgam fillings, it was quick to file a defensive statement: “The ADA owes no legal duty of care to protect the public from allegedly dangerous products used by dentists.”

I still have to read a journal regarding the stand of the Philippine Dental Association on the use of amalgam fillings.  I reckon that we still don’t have a unified stand on this as proven by the different health card companies ‘requiring’ dentists to use amalgam fillings for their client’s teeth instead of the tooth-colored composite resins.

What causes singaw?

1. There are many kinds of bacteria found in the mouth. An allergy to a particular type of bacterium can trigger a singaw.
2. It might be your immune system.
3. It might be hereditary.
4. You may have a nutritional deficiency in vitamins or nutrients such as vitamin B12, folic acid, vitamin C, or iron.
5. You may have undergone emotional stress, injury or trauma.

What should I do if have always recurrent singaw?

• Drink lots of fluid and take Vitamin C.
• Avoid injuries, especially to your mouth.
• Be careful in brushing your teeth; use oral gargles such as Betadine or Bactidol.
• Take singaw medicine.

For that last tip, this dentist in Makati found that Debacterol® has proven quite effective. Debacterol® is a liquid, topical, debriding agent used for treating ulcerating oral mucosal lesions, commonly referred to as canker sores, aphthous ulcers, or oral ulcers, as well as minor oral abrasions. It’s uniquely effective in the treatment of Recurrent Aphthous Stomatitis (Canker Sores); it is also a treatment for Aphthous Stomatitis that completely stops oral ulcer pain, seals damaged oral mucosal tissues and aids natural healing processes after just one application, which requires only minutes to perform.

How does Debacterol® work?

Simply dry the lesion with a cotton swab and apply Debacterol. In only seconds, the pain is gone! Typically, the lesion is replaced by healthy tissue in three to five days.

Why is DEBACTEROL® so effective over conventional products?

In order for any ulcerating mucosal lesion to heal, the factors causing the injury must first be controlled at the ulcer site. Then, any necrotic tissue debris in the ulcer bed must be removed so that healthy new cells are able to migrate into the damaged area and proliferate. In the normal course of healing in an untreated individual, the immune system is relied upon to perform and promote all of these activities. A limiting factor in the rate of ulcer healing is the capacity of the immune system of an individual to prevent further damage and to clear the way for repair cells to infiltrate and multiply.

This is what it looks like:

If you suffer regularly from singaw, please contact this dentist in Makati and I’ll set up an appointment with you and Debacterol®. We’ll then work out some kind of quality oral hygiene regimen for you so you can say goodbye to canker sores… permanently.

My wife and I are both Philippine dentists, so it puzzled and disappointed us to find a couple of gray areas (initial sign of cavities) forming in between our son’s lower front teeth, despite our meticulous cary preventive routine. Disappointed, she started doing research and came to the conclusion that our son inherited her salivary ph, which is a bit on the acidic side.  This doesn’t come as too much of a surprise because studies show that infants get the common oral bacterial flora primarily from their mothers since they are the ones who are physically closer – sharing oral utensils, kissing, etc. My wife, while growing up, was very meticulous about her oral health but noticed that no matter what she did, cavities do crop up now and then, while I was virtually cavity free (my saliva ph was on the basic side).

Her research led to her rediscovery of GC Tooth Mousse. I call it a rediscovery because we’d both heard about this product but didn’t give it much attention. After purchasing the product, my wife applied it on our son’s teeth after the nightly toothbrushing ritual, making sure it coated the teeth. We just left it in until he fell asleep.

After one or two weeks, we noticed that the gray areas disappeared, proving that tooth mousse really can reverse early signs of cavities. Since our four-year-old made for a terrific testimonial, my wife has since been singing praises about this product. We have booklets in our Makati dental clinic with information on how tooth mousse works, and sell tooth mousse at competitive rates too. Flavors are dependent on availability, but all flavors are certified ‘yummy’ by the kids of our friends.

Quick notes: Drinking or eating after application is not allowed to make sure the cream ’soaks’ into the oral cavity for a longer time, balancing the ph level of the saliva and enabling the calcium to be absorbed into the pores of the teeth.  And with the presence of calcium, the fluoride in the toothpaste used will easily penetrate the pores as well. The good thing about it is that it can be used by adults as well.  However, consistency is the key. The manufacturer recommends continuous use almost making it a daily habit concurrent with the use of fluoride toothpaste.