We do not see Holistic Dentistry as an alternative to the proven principles of good dental practice taught and represented by “School Dentistry”. Because a holistic dentist also works locally in the mouth to solve dental problems; he makes a root canal filling where a tooth is destroyed, and he integrates a bridge or an implant where a tooth is missing.
But Holistic Dentistry does not simply limit the medical horizon of health care to the appropriate crown margin, the firm fit of dental implants or an attractive tooth color. In Holistic Dentistry we have come to the conclusion that the tooth, jaw and mouth area is intensively and in a highly complex way networked with other body systems – in every human being. Any change in the tooth, jaw and mouth area can possibly affect other areas and also distant organs of the body. Therefore, in our opinion, there is a need for systemic and integrative decision-making and action in modern dentistry!
Holistic approach
Holistic dentistry also cares about the reaction of the entire body to the material of dental bridges or dental implants. For necessary dental procedures, every dentist must place filling material, dental prostheses and dental implants in your mouth, using inorganic materials.
However, it is important to deal with the following questions in advance:
How does a dead tooth or an inflamed jawbone affect the entire system of the human body?
What are the consequences of dental metals such as amalgam or gold for patients with intolerances?
Is the patient’s individual detoxification system able to handle the leaking solution products and metal ions?
In regular dentistry these aspects are often simply ignored. This can remain with patients with comparatively high load limits and tolerances without stressful consequences, but often has a devastating effect with intolerances or an already weakened immune system. Please also read the experiences of our practice patients.
What Holistic Dentistry does without
Since the reactions of your immune system to foreign material newly introduced into the body cannot be foreseen, we as a holistic dental practice have been avoiding the following working materials and methods for years:
- Mercury-containing amalgam
- Plastic fillings and plastic adhesives
- Metals for dental bridges and crowns
- Titanium for implants
- antibiotics, if medically justifiable
Instead, we use metal-free and biocompatible all-ceramic crowns and bridges, metal-free removable dentures and metal-free all-ceramic implants.
In addition, we do not grind the teeth quickly when preparing dental prostheses: Turbines are well known to every dentist patient because of the typical whistling of the whistle. You will not hear this unpleasant noise of the air-driven dental turbines! The number of revolutions of the regular turbines is up to 500,000 revolutions per minute. In this case heat damage can be caused in the tooth nerve, leading to the death of completely healthy teeth until then. In contrast, we use drills driven by electric motors with a maximum speed of up to 40,000 revolutions per minute. Some treatments may take a little more time, but the method is much more gentle on your tooth and therefore ultimately serves your health.
If necessary, we test the compatibility of new tooth replacement materials and also the compatibility of anaesthetic injections individually for each patient. A detailed list of our services as a holistic dentist can be found on the left under Holistic Dental Care.
Holistic dentistry: Philosophy and way of thinking
For affected patients, the fact that chronic diseases are increasing strongly in our modern industrial societies is unfortunately only a small consolation. At the same time, however, for most chronically ill patients it also becomes apparent that they are less and less treatable or less treatable with the methods of conventional medicine. Rheumatism and joint inflammations are just as far away from healing with conventional medical means as cancers and other diseases of the immune system and the body’s own defence system. This clearly shows that maintaining an intact immune and defence system is more important than ever.
Why not strengthen the immune system instead of investing in specific “solutions to symptoms”?
Unfortunately, today’s medicine is characterized by the search for quick patent solutions to any health problem using chemical pills. This is of course understandable, because pain can often be eliminated quickly with a painkiller, joint inflammation with a cortisone injection and inflammation-promoting bacteria with antibiotics.
But with the great chronic diseases of our time, conventional medicine with its Latin language is often at the end of its rope: in the search for “the cure for cancer”, billions have been wasted in vain so far, and the rapid suppression of symptoms by cortisone causes high follow-up costs.
The attempt to quickly combat bacteria with antibiotics, however, resulted in the cultivation of enormously resistant bacterial strains. The result: germs resistant to antibiotics now kill 10,000 patients a year in German hospitals.
For the holistic-systemic approach of our dental clinic, the ideal conception of an intact immune system results in the requirement to eliminate all disturbing influences which can weaken the body’s own defence.
What is the difference between Holistic Dentistry and Regular Dentistry?
Holistic dentistry therefore attempts to uncover and reduce the problems in the teeth, jaw and mouth that are responsible for the final state of the “disease”. It does not substitute cause for condition, and does not confuse individual symptom-triggering causes with the last, disease-triggering condition. But why is there such a big contrast between conventional medicine and holistic dentistry?
In general, the cardinal error of modern Western thinking lies in the overestimation of decomposition, analysis and specialization, while at the same time underestimating the merging and the so important overall view.
It goes directly from the symptom to its cause – this way is understandably very popular with many physicians because of its simplicity and directness, but is it also the right way to ensure your long-term health?
Important for the person concerned:
- Orthodox medicine cultivates the decomposition of an entire organism into its structural components.
- In practice, medicine without an overall view of the individual parts makes little sense for the person affected, because the individual consists of a complex network of various life functions.
- Modern, holistic medicine tries not to obstruct the view of the whole by isolated problems.
The holistic dentist sees your body as an integrated whole whose function is based on orderly relationships and undisturbed interactions between the individual areas. Holistic dentistry therefore requires a way of thinking that focuses on the “organizing relationships” between the individual areas.
This networked thinking is an elementary component of Holistic Dentistry.
The far-reaching cross-linking of all organic components of an organism forces one, on logical consideration, to take a holistic approach. Therefore, Holistic Dentistry does not concentrate on individual components, but rather on the basic principles of the organization of the whole.
For the internal communication between cells and organs, the organism has several systems at its disposal that work according to very different principles:
- A material-chemical system consisting of hormones, neurotransmitters and newly discovered messenger substances from the cytokine and interleukine series.
- An electrical system consisting of the nervous system that transports electrical impulses back and forth in the body via its own network.
- And an all-encompassing system of internal order and organization: the so-called basic system.
Substance and biochemistry are the material foundations of life – but they do not guarantee health in the sense of well-organized life processes. Unknown and little noticed chronic influences from the tooth, mouth and jaw area disturb the order and organization processes of the body, and thus become considerable dangers for the life processes on a physical, mental and spiritual level, which we generally call “health”.