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Beatlemania Has Deep Roots by Brandy White

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No stranger to the terms "shock and awe" or "whistle-blower," Dr. Michael Zuk is familiar with being at the center of media storms. After all, what do you expect to happen when you buy a Beatle's molar at auction?

It's been more than a year since Zuk placed the winning bid - more than $30,000 - on Lennon's molar at an English auction and the media attention hasn't faded. To spend that kind of money on someone else's tooth, you might think Zuk has quite the obsession with The Beatles - but you'd be wrong. His motivation was a little different than you might think. He's using the publicity to call attention to what he thinks are the biggest problems facing his profession today.

"It's kind of like one of those once-in-a-lifetime things," Zuk said. "It's weird and I have weird interests, although I'm an idea person and this is a rare opportunity. This is one of the biggest rock stars in the world, who's dead, who has tons and tons of fans, and this [tooth] is the only piece of potential DNA outside the family."

Although his purchase has landed him in Time Magazine, on TV with Bill O'Reilly and on Anderson Cooper's RidicuList, Zuk isn't shy and uses his newfound fame to do good. Zuk had a DNA pendant created using a bit of "tooth dust" from the molar. The pendant is now touring the United Kingdom in an effort to raise awareness about the dangers of oral cancer.

But Zuk's true passion lies with targeting and exposing what he calls "overly aggressive cosmetic dentistry." A former cosmetic dentist himself, Zuk and his classmate, Dr. Terry Mah, own and operate a dental mall clinic in Red Deer, Alberta. On any given day, the Bower Dental Centre sees more than 100 patients, but Zuk says his office is "more of a bread-and-butter-type practice" that isn't looking for big money as much as it is trying to help patients with honest treatment plans.

"If a patient sees me, I would typically be more concerned with first restoring the worn-down teeth with composite, then using shorter-term orthodontics and using these two as a combination," Zuk says of his practice philosophy. "It's basically a high-end restoration for just a mere fraction of what it would take to either do full-mouth veneers or hire an orthodontist and a prosthodontist to do the same thing."

Zuk says too few of his colleagues take a similar approach when developing treatment plans. While not everyone agrees with him, Zuk is adamant that, although veneers may look like the ideal option since patients leave with a sparkling smile and the dentist makes a great deal more money, adding porcelain where it is not necessary can leave patients with irreversible damage to their teeth and the dentist facing potential legal trouble.

"Yesterday I rebuilt the upper and lower front teeth of a patient with worn-down teeth," Zuk says. "It was 12 teeth, so what if each restoration is $200? Right there, you're looking at $2,400 an hour, so that's pretty good money, right? Of course, the porcelain guy is going to say, 'Well, I can make $20,000 an hour' But the problem with that is when patients find out that maybe their treatment was too aggressive, then all the money someone might make off over-treating someone could be wiped out in a few lawsuits."

Zuk, who refers to his blunt talk on aggressive cosmetic dentistry as his "crusade," was recently featured on a Canadian watchdog news show. The program invited Zuk to be a consultant to review the journalist's findings after an undercover researcher posing as a patient visited 20 different dental offices in Canada. A wide variety of treatments - and a bigger array of accompanying price tags - surprised the investigators. Zuk says the large range is due to a difference in opinion and treatment plans because each dentist receives different training, but he's quick to warn his colleagues against "up-selling" patients on more expensive treatments when they simply aren't needed. It's a philosophy Zuk insists upon at Bower Dental Centre.

"We want to treat patients well and just do good dentistry," Zuk says of his staff. "Because we have good new patient flow, we don't have to up-sell each individual patient into the most expensive treatment plan. There's not that pressure when patients walk through the door to jump on them and use our best sales techniques."

Zuk continues to use Lennon's tooth to draw publicity to this mission. With no plans of slowing down anytime soon, Zuk is exploring the possibility of DNA sequencing the molar. He's also currently working on his latest book, which he says will further dissect malpractice in the cosmetic dentistry industry.

Though Zuk admits to being a loose cannon at times, his crusade remains simple.

"Basically, I've had enough and I'm not shutting my mouth anymore," he says. "[I am] the rare source for the public about the truth about abusive cosmetic dentistry."

And if you're wondering what the controversial dentist's favorite Beatles' song is, the answer, like the dentist himself, is hard to figure out. But if you happen to stumble on his site dedicated to Lennon's molar (www.johnlennontooth.com), you'll hear the dentist's rendition of "Love Me Tooth," and you might be able to take a wild guess.

Author's Bio
Brandy White is a freelance reporter from Phoenix, Arizona
Dentaltown Magazine
September 2025
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