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From Trisha’s Desk Trisha E. O’Hehir, RDH, MS, Hygienetown Editorial Director

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Making the Connection
– by Trisha E. O’Hehir, RDH, BS, Hygienetown Editorial Director

June 24-25, 2011, marked the first Annual Scientific Session for the newly formed American Academy for Oral Systemic Health. There are academies for periodontics, general dentistry, dental hygiene, cosmetic dentistry, sleep medicine and others, so it's only fitting and timely to now have an academy for the oral systemic connection. This organization was founded by Townie Dr. Chris Kammer and a core group dedicated to "Making the Connection," as this first meeting aptly illustrated.

The two-day conference effectively made the connection between medicine and oral health with a line-up of speakers demonstrating significant links between oral health and cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, stroke and diabetes. While this year's audience was primarily dental professionals, with a few physicians, future meetings are predicted to show an increase in the number of medical colleagues attending.

Cardiovascular topics were covered by a physician-nurse practitioner team who developed the Bale-Dooneen Method of personalized risk assessment and disease management. Dr. Bradley Bale and Amy Dooneen created the Heart Attack and Stroke Prevention Center in Spokane, Washington, to find the root cause of inflamed blood vessels that could ignite future heart attacks and strokes. Their goal is to prevent heart attacks and they seem to be quite successful. Since beginning the center in 2003, they have treated 3,500 patients using the Bale-Dooneen Method and only one of those patients suffered a heart attack and has since made a complete recovery. Many of the patients are physicians with cardiovascular disease.

Audience participants were familiar with dental and periodontal research supporting a link between oral disease and many systemic conditions. How refreshing to be introduced to the vast array of similar research being published in medical journals. Several studies presented confirm a strong link between periodontal disease and high blood pressure. It's all about inflammation, similar to periodontitis, so it makes sense that one would be linked to the other. The subgingival extent of the periodontal open wound is about the size of the palm of your hand. Picture this: the entire endothelial system is the size of five tennis courts! Oral bacteria, endotoxins and cytokines all enter the blood stream and travel to other parts of the body. Before getting to the heart, fetus, pancreas or other organs, these toxic waste products travel through the blood vessels, often penetrating endothelial cells, the lining of the blood vessels. This is where changes occur, causing inflammation of the cells, allowing cholesterol to seep in and eventually breaking and leaking, leading to a coronary event.

Casey Hein, RDH, MBA, is currently working at the University of Manitoba producing a vast array of sophisticated yet easy-to-follow multimedia modules to educate non-dental/medical professionals on the latest understanding and research linking oral disease and diabetes. Understanding the inflammatory process of one disease helps one understand the inflammatory process of the other and how they are linked.

After a day and a half of scientific research building a strong case for the oral systemic link, dentist and inventor of PerioProtect, Dr. Duane Keller, provided practical information and scientific research to support a novel approach to lowering the bioburden of bacterial biofilm prior to invasive periodontal therapy. Hydrogen peroxide and antibiotics used in the PerioProtect trays direct and hold the antimicrobial/antibiotic substance in the subgingival area, significantly reducing biofilm prior to instrumentation that would otherwise dump millions of colony-forming units and toxic substances into the blood stream. This is an interesting local delivery alternative to systemic antibiotics.

You'll want to attend next year's AAOSH Annual Session as the research in this area is ever increasing! See you there!
Inside This Section
116: Message Board: Unimpressive Results
118: Perio Reports
112: Profile in Oral Health: Marketing Magic
126: Message Board: Abscessed Implant!
Look for additional content in the Hygienetown Magazine digital edition.
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