Just got back from the annual AAOSH – American Academy for Oral Systemic Health – meeting last week in Nashville and thought I’d do a quick rundown of a few of the take-home-and-use gold nuggets I mined there. I’m not going to bother with the biochemistry or physiology now. You can get that off the site links I provide. For now, here are the tools that I will be incorporating into my whole-health practice.
- SleepImage home sleep testing. I had dinner on the roof of John Rich’s Redneck Riviera with Criss Sakala, COO of SleepImage. And there he told me that the unabashed goal of their company is to “disrupt the industry”. And believe me, they are doing it. They have developed some cutting-edge software that allows them to do a really sweet at home sleep quality analysis for a mere $15! Imagine how that would impact your whole-health dental practice. Now you can run as many pre- and post-treatment analyses as you want, screening everyone who fails your stopBANG, without any worries about the mounting costs. Learn more about this breakthrough technology at SleepImage.com.
- OASYS sleep appliance. Speaking of sleep, have you heard of Dr. Mark Abramson’s OASYS appliance? I hadn’t either until I sat next to him on the shuttle from the airport. So I made sure to swing by his booth later to take a look, and was really intrigued with his unique design. One of the features that makes it unique, and frankly a bit funky looking, are the “antennae” he incorporates that open the nasal airway from the front as well as the normal mandibular repositioning. What really caught my attention though was the fact that the research they’ve done indicates that the OASYS appliance works as well as CPAP for severe apnea. Do you have any patients that would be interested in that? I know I do! Check them out here at DreamSystemsDentalLab.com.
- The bloodless Chronic Inflammation Test. If you are like me and don’t do anything IV, then you probably don’t have a phlebotomist in your office, which can be a severe handicap if you are wanting to follow the effects that your treatments are having on your patients’ inflammatory load. One of the goals of our periodontal, sleep, and lifestyle interventions should be to put out the fire and lower chronic systemic inflammation. And knowing if that is working would really be nice. Well now you can, without having to draw blood, with the urine based Chronic Inflammation Test from Inflammatory Markers Laboratory. I will be doing this along with bacterial surveys and the A1c/cholesterol screening that we are already doing in conjunction with our CHIP Program. To learn what exactly they are measuring and its significance to your patients’ health, go here – ChronicInflammationTest.com.
- The ASEA Redox and Biome twofer. Finally, as I was patiently waiting to get another vendor’s attention, I heard a voice behind me say “Hi Lon”. And when I turned around there was Dr. Lee Ostler. Lee is on the AAOSH advisory counsel and author of the Healthcare Professionals Networking Handbook and The Physicians Resource Manual, both of which I have made extensive use of. As we caught up on what we are each currently up to, I became intrigued by the work he has been doing with reduction-oxidation, NrF2 synergization, and their applications to dentistry.
You or someone you know may already have experience with ASEA, or redox molecules in general – over 15,000 peer reviewed articles and 1,200 books have been published on the subject, there is even an dedicated professional association (The Society for Redox Biology and Medicine) to study their implications and use. In short, redox molecules 1) have microbicidal activity against pathogens (100% kill in under 30 seconds) and spare commensals (good bacteria), 2) stimulate cellular antioxidant production at a 1:1,000+ ratio, 3) promote exponential T-cell production, and 4) reverse cellular aging to name just a few.
Lee has written a clinical manual – REDOX DENTISTRY: Elevating Oral-systemic Healthcare to the Next Level – and has a website that I’d encourage you to check out to learn more. We will be running some clinical trials at our Masters Dental Research Foundation and would be glad to include you if you’re interested. Contact Lee or myself for details.
Before I leave the ASEA subject, I also want to mention that they also have a probiotic supplement called Biome that has an amazing 16 different bacterial strains as well as prebiotic “fertilizer”. Most supplements only have 2-3. Needless to say, I’m adding that to my toolbox too. Again, contact Lee or me if you’re interested.
If you were there, you probably have your own list, but this is mine. In the near future, I’ll be writing a few summaries of what I found to be the most compelling presentations. Keep your eyes out for them.