Our New York City dental practice has considered the whole body relationship of dental disease for 24 years. We obtain periodontal cultures of patients with advanced gum disease, based upon the early work of Dr. Max Listgarten. The recent discovery of diabetes in a patient based initially on periodontal (gum) diagnosis is a case in point. The Center for Special Dentistry (www.NYCdentist.com) is proud to work with Dr. Keith Berkowitz at the Center for Balanced Health (www.CenterForBalancedHealth.com) in mid-town NYC. The fasting glucose tolerance test they performed to diagnose the patient’s diabetes will contribute to the overall health of this 42 year young woman. This should be considered the standard of care in dentistry particularly with the present Administration’s push to expand healthcare for all. It will improve health, save lives and is cost-effective. For microbiology results from Temple University’s Oral Microbiologic Testing Lab visit:
http://www.nycdentist.com/?fuseaction=atlas.displayImage&im_id=2249&at_id=243&at_parent_id=242

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Reply:

Please re-read my comments:  I said our dental practice screened the patient for diabetes but worked with Dr. Keith Berkowitz (M.D.) at The Center for Balanced Health for diagnosis and treatment.  Dentists should not diagnose and treat diabetes but they can be invaluable in screening patients.

Separately, most physicians do not have any understanding of dentistry nor how it relates to systemic health.  It should be part of medical school.  Just 15 minutes ago we had to reschedule a patient who underwent AV Nodal Reentrant Tachycardia (AVNRT) in March at a prominent Long Island heart hospital but was not given instructions to premedicate for dental procedures for the first six months post-op.

The Center for Special Dentistry in NYC has created a health care model for academic and clinical dentistry that has been successful for over a decade. It is affiliated with both Columbia and NYU dental schools. The Obama administration may learn about it at www.NYCdentist.com/faculty. We’d be thrilled to help expand it nationally and include medicine.

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Mr. President,

America cannot rely on companies like Aetna to lead it out of a deepening healthcare crisis.  They are part of Wall Street not Main Street.

Our country needs to incubate American entrepreneurial ingenuity in healthcare, from the bottom up, similar to current efforts in the auto (X Prize) and green energy industries.  It is the doctors, dentists, nurses, pharmacists, PAs, therapists and others working with their patients each day that might have the next GREAT idea.  $100 million in stock options to healthcare CEOs does not rally the troops.  Listening to them might help.

Why not create a “suggestion box” directly between American healthcare workers and the Surgeon General?  Let Americans do what they do best.  Innovate.

Read the Wall Street Journal article.