You MUST read this!
At this stage of my lifetime dental education , it’s rare that I learn something that is a revolutionary advance beyond my information base.  The office is now implementing just such an advance, and we couldn’t be more enthusiastic.
Caroline, Lynn, and I attended a course on “Ozone Use in Dentistry” in late February, 2011,  and returned from a long weekend in  rainy  California more excited than after any course in our memories.

So what’s the big deal?  Every one of you has encountered ozone in its industrial use.  It disinfects municipal water supplies, the water in hot tubs and in the Coca Cola you drink, and the air in public rest rooms.  The same ozone that can be an EPA-labeled pollutant in large quantities is extremely safe if used in a controlled environment in calibrated doses.
Where the U.S. lags behind the rest of the industrialized world is in the medical uses of ozone.  Ozone can be injected into joints to kill bacteria that may be linked to certain kinds of arthritis, and can have tremendous benefits in wound healing.  It is the safest and most potent killer of bacteria, viruses, and even prions (those annoying little things that cause Mad Cow Disease).   Ozone also kills MRSA, a dangerous variety of staph infection that is extremely resistant to antibiotics.
The FDA has classified ozone as a “new drug.”  This severely impedes ozone use in the U.S..  This “new drug” has been in medical use since the 1850s.  Medical and dental ozone research is way ahead of the U.S. in England, Ulster (Northern Ireland), South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Germany, Russia, and even Cuba!  And we lag behind.
I believe that I am one of only about 10 dentists in Pennsylvania  who is trained to use ozone. 

How can ozone help you?   Every day, our office waterlines are disinfected with ozonated water.  This is the most effective killer of waterline biofilm ever developed.  OK, so what is biofilm?   Biofilm is the gunk that builds up inside thin-diameter tubing. It consists of zillions of bacteria.  Did you ever look at an ice cube from your fridge’s icemaker and see a dark, almost black, spot in the ice?  That’s a piece of biofilm that has broken off from the inside of your thin copper water tubing (your icemaker wouldn’t work without water, and the water gets there through thin tubing;  the thinner the tubing, the higher percent of its insides are biofilm).    You just had a zillion bacteria in your scotch and soda!   Many of these bacteria can be relatively harmless to you unless your immune system is compromised.  Is your immune system in perfect shape?  How do you know?  Why chance it, especially if ozonated water can kill off the biofilm in dental water unit lines, which consist of very fine tubing—and lots of it?

The link between gum disease and heart disease is many times stronger than the link between high cholesterol and heart disease!  When your doctor told you to lower your cholesterol, it was definitely time to worry.  Now, for the first time, your dental team has the ability to fundamentally change the kind of bacteria in your mouth.    
Think about it:  if you added up the gum tissue lining all your teeth, you’d have a bacteria-infested area bigger than the size of your palm.  From now on, every time we’ll clean your teeth we’ll be using ozonated water in our Cavitrons;   those are the ultrasonic devices we’ve used for many years to break up bacterial plaque and tartar.  We’re using the most advanced methods available to fundamentally change the balance of germs in your mouth from good (usually  aerobic, or oxygen-loving)-and-bad (mostly anaerobic, or oxygen-hating) to almost completely good.  You get the benefits of the Cavitron PLUS the germ-killing abilities of ozone. Your daily home care helps prevent the return of anaerobic bacteria.  These dangerous bugs take about three months to rebuild in the mouth after a professional cleaning under normal circumstances,  You can minimize their return with daily brushing and flossing.  Simple steps to health.

How does ozone do this?  The oxygen we breathe has two atoms of oxygen hooked together, or what is referred to as O2,  Ozone has an extra atom of oxygen, so it’s O3.
That extra atom of oxygen makes for an unstable compound;  the O3 wants to shed its extra oxygen atom and become O2 again.  So, how do anaerobic (oxygen-hating) germs react to all that extra oxygen being given off when your teeth and gums are cleaned with ozonated water?  They die, and they die in large quantities.

Ozone kills the nasty anaerobic germs, and, equally  important, it kills their waste products;  what is scientifically known as “germ-poop.”  What fills in the void when the bad germs are gone?  Good germs.  What do your coronary arteries say to that?  “Thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

Let’s sum up what we’ve shared so far.  Ozone kills bad germs and germ-poop.  There’s a strong correlation between gum disease (a contagious BACTERIAL infection) and heart disease.  So, for the first time, we have the capacity to modify what’s in your mouth to make your entire body more conducive to a state of health.  That’s why we’re so excited!  I became a dentist to help people, because my terrific-role-model childhood dentist so obviously wanted to help me and his other patients.  He lived for that, as do I.  Now, I can help people more than ever before in a way that I never dreamed could be.   I’m totally jazzed by this!

Now for the obligatory legalese.  If ozone has not received FDA approval, can it legally be used in the U.S.?  The answer is an unequivocal “YES.”  Dr. Atkins, of the famous Atkins Diet, used ozone in his medical practice.  He told his patients of the potential risks and benefits;  in other words, he received what the law calls “an informed consent.”   He was prosecuted over his use of something not approved by the FDA.  The court ruled that he had the right to use what he felt could help his patients as long as he informed them of the risks and benefits. And I have that right, too.  The court ruled that the FDA did not have the legal right to interfere in this process.
Every day, doctors prescribe drugs for what is called “off-label” use, that is, a use that has not been approved by the FDA but has been shown by research and/or experience to be potentially beneficial to the patient.  Sodium hypochlorite has been used by thousands of dentists on millions of occasions as a germ-killer during root canal treatment, and that is a perfect example of an off-label use;  the FDA has not approved sodium hypochlorite for this use, yet it is used safely every day in dental offices across the country.  It is, in fact, almost universally accepted in dentistry specifically for that use.

Medical/dental ozone use is remarkably safe. As it is used in my office, it has no significant risks, and my team and I have taken great care to make it so.

More about ozone
In the April, 2011 newsletter, I told you about our exciting introduction of ozone (or, as my patient, Guy, refers to it,
”special secreet sauce.”  You go, Guy!) to the practice.  Here’s more information:

What are some of the other dental uses of ozone?
—Wound-healing.  Since ozone kills germs and germ-poop, a surgical site can heal more quickly if ozone is applied to it after surgery.

—Cold sores (caused by herpes virus) can be sterilized in about a minute.  The pain often goes away instantly, and the ulcer is no longer contagious.  Best of all, in about 25% of the cases the herpes virus is inactivated so effectively that the ulcer does not return (in the other 75% of cases, the ulcer is still sterilized, but more virus is stored in areas called ganglia, to be released at a later date.  This usually happens when you and your body are under stress).

—Completely arresting tooth decay, sometimes with no drilling whatsoever.    Ozone kills the bugs that cause decay.  It sterilizes certain types of cavities (gumline cavities and chewing-surface cavities are prime examples).   To do this properly, I have to follow several steps.  Let’s take a chewing-surface cavity as an example:
Step one is to diagnose the decay as early as possible, using an electronic early-decay-detection system such as the laser Diagnodent I’ve had since 1999.  I was one of the first dentists in the area to have a Diagnodent, and now Michelle and Caroline have their own Diagnodents.   Use of this system will become part of a regular checkup for many of you (remember, the Diagnodent can’t “see” through crowns and fillings, so it was invented too late for the metal-mouthed among you.  Preventive dentistry wasn’t around to help you in childhood, but it is very much around in my office to help your kids).
Step two is to remove surface decay with an air abrasion unit (we have had one in each treatment room for many years).  A stream of tiny aluminum oxide particles, almost as hard as industrial diamond dust, selectively removes the soft decay, leaving healthy tooth structure relatively untouched.
Step three: decay-detecting dye checks to see if all the decay has been removed.  If not, ozone gas can be applied to the tooth (under a sealed “dome,” of course), to sterilize the remaining decay-infected tooth structure.
Step four:  a solution of minerals is applied to the tooth.  Since bacterial acids remove minerals from the tooth, leading to the decay hole we call a cavity, it’s helpful to put those lost minerals back into the tooth.
Step five:  a filling is bonded to the tooth, or,sometimes, the tooth is left alone to remineralize and “heal itself.”  The decay infection has been neutralized.

How many dentists use the Diagnodent?   The last time I saw this surveyed, the percentage was VERY low.  Same thing with air abrasion and decay detecting dye.  Why is this so?  I don’t know.  I’ve spent more than a year—a 365 day year, not a work year— of my life in continuing education classes and workshops.  Knowledge is my passion  (thanks so much, mom and dad, for passing that on to me).   I can just tell you why I do what I do.

—Treating sensitive teeth.   Ozone works extremely well at desensitizing teeth, especially teeth sensitive at or just above the gumline.  We’ve had other materials and methods for doing this, but ozone appears to be the easiest and most predictable.  It’s mechanism of action is unique;  it kills the bacteria in the tiny exposed “tubules” at the gumline.  Then we apply a remineralizing solution to seal the tubules so bacteria can’t get back in.
Cost of the treatment is nominal.  It’s $35 per tooth, and you don’t pay if the treatment doesn’t work.  Yes, we’re that confident that it WILL work.

—Sterilizing root canals.   There are   small “lateral” or “accessory” canals that branch off from the main canals that may contain diseased tissue.  Conventional instruments are well suited to remove the bulk of infected or inflamed tissue within the main canals, but cannot reach the bacteria and diseased tissue that lie in the accessory canals.  Here’s what we can do now that we could never do before:  we can sterilize the entire canal system, including lateral canals, by flooding the inside of the tooth with ozone gas after the main canals have been treated with conventional instruments and ozonated water.  The result: better success, and the tooth is no longer a possible source of sepsis.