Modern Day Root Canals: Saving Teeth Will Save Healthcare | Sonia Chopra, DDS | TEDxFarmingdale
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXnhqe3TFFw Video ID: XXnhqe3TFFw ============================================================ [Applause] our mouths are the gateway to our bodies did you know that we have 32 teeth that's 16 on top and 16 on the bottom i was born without eight of my 32 adult teeth and so i always say i was literally born to be a dentist we didn't realize how much trouble this issue was going to cause me until i was about 17 years old that's when the pain started and i had no idea where it was coming from after about my fourth dental appointment with no clear diagnosis i heard my dentist tell my mom that my pain was all in my head i was frightened to think just how much longer i was going to have to live with this pain and i was no longer sure if i could trust what my own body was telling me eventually after calling the office so many times hey there me again my dentist got so fed up with me always calling that he sent me to the oral surgeon to pull my tooth may i remind you that we still didn't know where this pain was coming from prior to this referral i vividly remember the oral surgeon questioning the instructions to extract that tooth on my on that referral slip i could feel his hesitation as he looked down and he read the paper i mean my tooth was fully intact it wasn't broken down or anything it was just causing me pain he numbed me up and he took out my tooth i was pain-free for the moment because i was numb but when that anesthesia wore off that pain was back with a vengeance i still had the same pain my toothache wasn't gone how is this possible and then it hit me i realized what had just happened it was the unthinkable they diagnosed and extracted the wrong tooth now i'm missing nine teeth and i still have the same problem i was devastated because taking out a tooth is it's irreversible and my body was simply defeated by that unbearable pain after living with this infection for several months my body finally gave up and couldn't fight that infection anymore my jaw swelled up and my body started to spike a fever and after being to several different specialists i thought i had exhausted all of my options but then finally i was referred to an endodontist who found the source of my problem and ended honest as a root canal specialist or a tooth saver in my dictionary i had cracked a different tooth and that crack became a doorway for bacteria to get into my tooth and infect the nerve inside the pain was massive and it was referring to other areas of my mouth and this happens all the time by the way and it threw everyone for a loop but this doctor he saved me he ended my pain and he told me it was okay to trust my body again this experience is what led me to my career because i myself became an endodontist and i see this exact same tooth story happen every single day in my practice we value our skin we value our hair our muscles yet we don't place the same value on our teeth and they deserve respect and since you've got 32 of them that's 32 chances that you may need a root canal or have an experience much like mine so listen up the removal of teeth is a far too common occurrence that happens in the dental chair and the premature removal of teeth can often have an effect on one's overall health and lead to a loss of time loss of money sleep self-esteem and confidence in yourself and in the health care system my tooth pain as a teenager cost my parents close to ten thousand dollars to fix there goes our family vacation now the root canal wasn't ten thousand dollars but i had to pay for the original dental work the extraction of the wrong tooth the root canal that was actually needed and now i had to pay for three implants to replace my teeth instead of one dentistry gets a bad rep and root canals even more just look at how the world depicts dentistry it's amazing what we believe to be true about this entire industry it looks barbaric doesn't it but dentistry has come a long way through innovation and technology yet as a society we can't shake the picture that's been painted i mean how many more times am i going to have to hear i'd rather get a root canal than dot dot dot i mean come on that kind of hurts my feelings but there's an even deeper problem with dentistry and that's the education system endodontics is not just the science behind what's going on in the inside part of the tooth but it is the science behind diagnosing tooth pain and coming up with the right treatment plan and since 80 percent of people seek us out when they have tooth pain it's really important for us to have a deep understanding of this specialty if we as dentists really want to help our patients and it's equally important for patients to have a similar understanding if they want to be better advocates for their own oral health as a patient you've got a choice of who you want as your provider but first you need to know that people like us even exist there are endless benefits to taking care of your teeth in your mouth your mouth is the gateway to your body and your teeth bring in nourishment and hydration to your bodies losing teeth can affect your airway and lead to sleep apnea and those pearly whites are what give you the confidence to attract a life partner so you can live that long and healthy life with someone special a healthy mouth is the first part of a healthy gut and it's how we communicate it's all through our mouths our bodies have an insane ability to regenerate the bone around our teeth so when we pull teeth that have been infected with bacteria instead of repairing them or saving them we're preventing our body's natural ability to regenerate the bone around those teeth this is an x-ray of a tooth that has a pretty bad infection this dark shadow that you see here around the root this is where the patient has lost all their supporting bone around that tooth because of that infection as an endodontist i'm a tooth saver and so my treatment of choice is usually to save that tooth by doing a root canal but i know many that would opt to take this tooth out but when you clean the inside part of the tooth where the bacteria is hanging out and you change that environment back into a healthy one you allow the miracle that naturally exists within us so that our bodies can heal on its own we can regrow our own bone back we are miraculous regenerative creatures and much like an octopus can regrow its tentacle after it's been bitten off by a shark we can grow our own bone back it took about a hundred days for the octopus in the film my octopus teacher for her to grow her tentacle back and for my patient it took her about one year to grow all her own bone back with no additional medical intervention she didn't have to change her diet or take any fancy supplements or outrun sharks she simply had to be herself and let her body do its thing and the natural outcome of that and the long-term outcome of that natural healing is absolutely free this is how beautiful our bodies are and the power of a root canal this is why giving your tooth a chance is far more affordable and can decrease healthcare costs globally people the function of your jaw bones is to support the teeth within it you take out those teeth and you take away that bone's function and that bone atrophies much like your arm does when you break it and you have to put it in a cast and you take away its function it becomes skinny and weak right the same thing happens to our jawbone here's another scenario for you to swallow how many of you know what to do if you knock out a front tooth i bet you never thought about it right i mean we're all supposed to learn cpr back in the day when i was a babysitter i was required to learn cpr but nobody ever taught me what to do if the child that i was watching tripped and fell and knocked out their front tooth according to the national center of biotechnical information 24 of all er trauma cases involve dental injuries picture this it's a beautiful day you're innocently playing in the backyard with your child jumping on the trampoline and all of a sudden one of you lands wrong and your child takes a knee to the face and their front tooth goes flying what do you do besides panic some of you may pick up the tooth and put it in a ziplock bag others were taught to put it in milk which is actually a better option and then you head to the emergency room but do you know what'll give you the best prognosis it's getting that tooth back into that socket right away and then head to your dentist not the er at the er they're gonna make you wait and time is of the essence in this situation so first you want to find that tooth you want to pick it up by the crown that's the white part that you see when you smile don't touch the root because you don't want to damage the root and if you feel like that tooth is a little dirty you can give it a slow stream of milk but don't rinse it with water and be very gentle water will do more damage than good then put that tooth right back in the socket and when you can re-implant that tooth in under 30 minutes it's almost like that tooth never left the body okay hold that tooth in place and get to your dentist or your endodontist this is how you save your child's front tooth their smile and their lifelong confidence do you see how this little piece of information can save smiles everywhere at schools on play dates on vacations this kind of simple education can have profound results and when we have more educated patients that can be better advocates for their own oral health we can solve a huge problem we can have less misdiagnoses and more money spent on care that's actually needed needing a root canal is not the worst diagnosis in the world in fact most of the time it's preventable by getting to your dentist regularly but a root canal is a very delicate art form and when done by an experienced clinician you can actually fall asleep check out this patient who's had several prior root canals and is in need of another treatment on one of these teeth and that means she's paying for that treatment all over again let me break it down for you the cost of not knowing this information goes like this you take time off of work maybe you head to the emergency room because you're in pain you spend money on medications and then you pay for treatment and then the treatment doesn't work and you're taking time off of work again maybe you're back in the emergency room in pain again you spend more money on more medications and then you're paying for treatment again do you see how the cost of all this can add up to thousands of dollars for just one tooth that's just one tooth for just one person it's like the cost of a luxury vacation in an overwater bungalow in bora bora had this patient been more informed and received care that solved her problem the first time she would have saved time and money along with her tooth today we have the benefits of using 3d imaging microscopes and sonic irrigation technology to comprehensively treat these infections this type of imaging not only allows us to see the problem more clearly than the 2d but it also gives us a true appreciation of the internal anatomy of each and every one of these teeth these itty-bitty canals are really hard to find and that's why it wasn't treated in the first root canal and because they are so hard to find that's why we use microscopes to find them and nowadays we use sonic irrigation technology to clean up the bacteria from these itty-bitty canals the cardinal rules of root canal therapy go like this you've got to find all the canals and get to the end of every single canal or that root canal is likely going to need to be redone and that's what we did here to save her tooth so you could get with this or you could get with that bye bye bora bora over time the world of endodontics has evolved into what i call the modern day root canal we as dental professionals are swimming in innovation this innovation and trusting the technology is what makes this delicate and beautiful procedure not only extremely effective but extremely safe we're going through a renaissance if you will when it comes to saving teeth there's no better time to get a root canal than now and it's my hope that this renaissance supports the understanding of the collective solution of both education and patient advocacy so we can take ownership of the decision making around our teeth not only educating ourselves as patients but also furthering the education of dental professionals we can work together to create this kind of change in society around our teeth our health and our general well-being our relationship to our teeth is so important and when we remove a tooth that can actually be saved we're removing a piece of our identity and digging deep into our bank accounts together we can reduce global healthcare costs by millions of dollars and create a more happy and healthy society by choosing to save our teeth you 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