Health

As you can imagine, most dental offices are bombarded daily with questions about dental insurance. “Do you take my plan? How much is covered? Why is dental insurance coverage so bad?” These are just a few of the questions we hear daily. So, why is dental insurance the...

I have focused the majority of my career on family preventive and general dentistry. While I enjoy most aspects of what I do, I firmly believe that a good percentage of dental problems are avoidable, which means that dentists shouldn’t be as busy as we are with...

I think it is safe to say that our healthcare system has some flaws. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a healthcare system that realized that everything in the body is connected? Unfortunately, there are no reasonable solutions for this in the near future. Therefore, it is...

There are many people who suffer with pain involving some area of the head. Toothaches can cause pain, but these are mostly avoidable with proper diet, home care and regular visits to your dentist. Teeth can also play an indirect role in facial/head pain. Orofacial...

Baseball season is in full “swing” this season with many kids playing throughout the summer. Here’s a lesson about why it’s important to protect your teeth no matter what you are playing.  In the spring of 1939, in celebration of the 100th year anniversary of...

The key to a child's good dental health begins before his or her teeth become visible. Here are some answers to some of the most frequently asked dental health questions relating to pregnancy, infants, toddlers and children. 1. Does being pregnant affect my oral...

In a recent study published by the American Dental Association (ADA), visits to the emergency room (ER) for dental related issues have doubled nationwide over the last decade. Last year, over 2.1 million people visited the ER for a dental “emergency”, most of which...

Dental caries (cavities, decay) is still very prevalent in today’s society. There are many factors that contribute to dental decay. In addition, there are some people who are more susceptible to decay than others. In a recent article in the Journal of the American...

Last week I introduced a couple who had been seeing the same dentist for 30 years and were finally forced to make a change due to the dentist’s retirement. They visited a “new” dentist and were turned off because the dentist recommended significant treatment. Then...

People often ask me how I have time to write columns, and how I’ve come up with topics for as long as The Town Common has been around. If you have read my columns over the years, you’ll remember I have discussed that time was one of the barriers keeping people from...