I thought it was worth sharing – they’re almost all some variation on the floss being used as a stronger form of string, but you may find it useful.

This one made me chuckle, as I can see myself doing it in a pinch on a climb, but not quite in everyday life:

7. Replace a broken shoelace.

Certainly not a permanent solution, but yes, it would work. If you’ve found yourself in position to utilize floss in any interesting way, let me know in the comments.

Originally published as Other Uses For Dental Floss

Today they wrote about a recent study conducted in Sweden says massaging toothpaste into your teeth will help give you a fluoride boost.

…rub the toothpaste onto your teeth and gums and massage it in. That’s all there is to it—and doing so gives your teeth a “shot” of fluoride that’ll keep them protected all afternoon long.

They recommend using this as a mid-day brushing session.

Taking a look at the actual study, it seems this is another study that has very specific parameters. In this case, an extremely high concentration fluoride toothpaste was necessary to see the results.

In any case, it’s definitely interesting. I can’t say I would recommend it without knowing more, but I thought it was interesting and worth sharing.

Originally published as A Massage For Your Teeth?

As an avid environmentalist, this really caught my eye.

“That a product is certified is not a guarantee it will perform,” said Michael Klement, generally regarded as a leading green residential architect in southeast Michigan.

He said he learned this the hard way when paint bearing “a good green credential” failed in a real-world application that fortunately was his own house and not a client’s. The paint didn’t cure properly and 12 years later, it’s still “sticky.”

This gentlemen and other experts noted that a lot of green building materials are hopping on the trend, and the products aren’t quite proven yet. He said he likes to give something five years on the market, which seems about right.

In any case, I thought I would share this. There are similar trends with green products in other industries, as well – always do your research!

Originally published as Is Green Always Best?

It’s an interesting study, though I have not reviewed the whole thing yet.

It does stimulate concern over the need for radiography, dosage and exposure frequency, and we are always concerned about radiation safety for our patients and staff. Some notes about how we handle this:

1) We use every precaution listed here with the ADA. (Be aware, that link is to a PDF file.)

2) We also invested in new digital radiograph equipment two years ago, which allowed us a decrease of 25% of the ‘most sensitive’ film dose.

3) We employ the principles of ALARA, or radiation As Low As Reasonably Achievable. We don’t use radiographs at the same intervals for all patients – everyone is classified individually for radiographic imaging needs. For example, patients at low risk for cavities may only need new x-rays every 18-36 months.

4) Any patient can refuse radiographic imaging in our office. Radiographic imaging is a service we provide to maintain your health. It is a fantastic tool for saving teeth, finding pathology/infection, malformations and diagnosing gum and bone disease. Without radiographs, oral health care is severely compromised.

However, if a patient is well informed of these details they can decide to refuse the radiographic service by signing a waiver, which we note in the patient’s chart. We always want what is best for you; which can include what YOU think is best for you, as long as you are well informed and understand all the risks and benefits.

Now, back to the tumor study.

To me, it sounds like a very preliminary study which has a significant basis on the participants’ memories. There are several other areas of concern with the study criteria. Specifically, I’m concerned about how the study groups were selected. Further, the group of participants with brain tumors may have been selected easily due to the presence of meningiomas. But how did they select the comparison group? Was it a truly random group representative of the tumor cohort? How were they able to correct for a person’s memory? Were actual dental records utilized?

This may work as an additonal study idea: could we take the total number of dental patients on the planet and then compare that to the total number of dental patients who have meningiomas, and get a rough idea on the fraction of dental patients developing a meningioma? We could then also look at the dental restorative history of the meningioma group and determine whether there is a significant difference. This could be easy, because if someone has had dental care, they almost certainly have had a dental x-ray.

Hopefully, the findings of this study means we could soon have an additional, more defined one.

In any case, I believe this is very important information. New studies are vital, and helps our practice to take a refined look at how we operate in this and other areas of patient care. The one rule we have right now is to make sure every patient is well-informed, and to use ALARA as a guideline.

The American Dental Association has reviewed the study and released their own statement here.

Originally published as Dental X-Rays & Brain Tumors

Turns out the answer is that there actually is one!

I called Johnson and Johnson today to find out why I cannot find any Reach products at Target, Walmart, CVS. They told me to call Reach which I did. They would not answer my question about lack of product availability and told me they are aware there is a shortage and they are endeavoring to get their product out to the market.

I then called my dentist and he called his rep that gives him the little sample packs and she was out of those too!

Goodness! It’s a conspiracy I tell ya.

I was really surprised by this, and certainly would never find a lack of dental floss humorous. Thanks to everyone for the feedback, and more so, thanks for the heavy interest in flossing!

Originally published as About That Dental Floss Shortage

To keep the gunk in check and easily clean when necessary put a layer of toilet paper, paper towels, or tissues in the bottom of the cup.

They then instruct you to change that out every few months. Months?

This seems a bit lengthy to me. Honestly, I can’t say I recommend this method at all. The best thing you can do – and it couldn’t be easier – is to throw that cup in your dishwasher on a weekly basis.

Originally published as What To Do About That Toothbrush Cup

“All (of our) garments are engineered to be garment-recycled at the end of their life, but the technology to reclaim the garments has not been fully developed,” said Stacy Flynn, global director of sustainable development for Rethink. “We need to ensure that garments get back in the supply chain.”

There are two elements of the shirt that are notable as far as being environmentally conscious.

The first is obvious, and that’s the recycling of the water bottles. I doubt I need to point out that there are a lot of water bottles out there in 2012!

A second part of this process that I wasn’t as aware of is that their production process makes the shirts themselves recyclable. According to their site, we threw out 8.9 million tons of textiles in 2010. That’s a massive number!

I’ll be interested to follow this company’s progress. You can also check out Rethink on Facebook.

Originally published as Recycled Water Bottle T-Shirts

I’ve read some odd things related to dentistry online, and this “Answer Man” column in a Minnesota newspaper is now among the oddest.

Apparently this column is used to ask the columnist literally anything.

Is there a current national shortage of dental floss? Or a manufacturing deficiency? What are we and other diligent flossers to do? Please help us, Answer Man. You’re our only hope. — Frustrated about Floss

Sorry, Flossy, but I can’t find any evidence of a critical national shortage of this product. I called some local pharmacies and stores and they say there’s enough floss to go around, so I’ll just recommend that you keep trying.

I can’t imagine what would compel someone to write the newspaper in order to find out such a thing – so much so that I’ll assume it’s made up. Maybe the whole column is an elaborate joke?

In any case, the whole thing gave me a laugh, and if nothing else, perhaps we can take away from this that people in Minnesota are flossing a lot. (I can also confirm that there is no dental floss shortage.)

Originally published as Dental Floss Shortage?

While I was sure these were not special-effects laden products, I had little doubt their marketing department was using the term “3D” purely as a hook of some kind.

The question was whether they could actually make it work. The answer is…kind of.

They claim the focus of these whitening products are focused on three factors. In no particular order:

1) Whiten
2) Clean
3) Protect

Basically, that’s it. The products are supposed to do those three things for your mouth…exactly like all the other consumer dental products. Not sure where the “D” comes in. (Maybe there are some special effects in there somewhere!)

In any case, their marketing hook worked on me – I took the time to check out the line more closely. Have you used these products?

Originally published as 3D Toothpaste

This might be one of the more irreverent posts I’ve written on this blog, but I couldn’t pass up this unique use of toothpaste out of China.

Qingdao police pulled over a Chinese Porsche owner this past week when they noticed the sevens on the man’s license plate didn’t look quite right. Upon further inspection they noticed that what appeared to be sevens were actually number ones with toothpaste applied to alter them.

The man’s reason for altering his plate was being six points short of losing his license. Maybe thing work differently in China, but if I were him, I think I’d just try not to break any further traffic laws rather than do what he did.

If if I were prone to such a deception, I think I could find a better way to alter my plate than toothpaste!

Originally published as Most Unique Use of Toothpaste Yet