Not too long ago, I had a leak under my kitchen sink. Like most homeowners, I wanted to see what the problem was before I called for a plumber, in the unlikely event I could fix it myself! I brought home a dental mouth mirror from work, pulled out a flashlight and stuck my head under the sink. When my husband asked me if I saw anything, I replied that it was dark in there and I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to be looking for anyway! As those words came out of my mouth, it occurred to me that this is what my patient s tell me daily when they come in for a dental problem. With the two new digital advancements I’m about to discuss ,however, I can help my patients not only solve their dental problems, but better educate them on the care and maintenance of their own mouths by allowing them to see what I see on a daily basis.
Dentistry has gone digital! If it’s been a while since you went to your dentist, then you may be unaware of all the changes that have been happening in today’s dental offices, all of them for the better!
For starters, the way we diagnose your dental problem has changed! Up until fairly recently, a traditional dental radiograph (xray) was taken with film. This film, after being placed in your mouth and exposed to radiation, was then dipped in a series of chemicals in a darkroom to eventually provide an image of your tooth. Oftentimes the quality of the resulting image was affected by the temperature and age of those chemicals. Additionally, the image took at least five minutes to be available for the dentist to view.
Nowadays, with the advent of digital xrays, an image of your tooth is visible in seconds, and no longer requires the use of a darkroom for developing. More importantly, from the perspective of the dental patient, the radiation needed to produce a good quality image has been decreased by over 50% with digital! Additionally, because the image is digital, it can be easily enlarged or enhanced for better diagnoses. For more information about digital xrays and how they benefit the patients, go to: http://www.dexis.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=36&Itemid=45
Another digital tool that has become invaluable in my office is the digital camera. The camera is the size and shape of a wand. It connects directly into the computer and can be placed in your mouth. I can then see magnified close up images of your mouth. For the first time in dentistry, you can see it what I see!! On many occasions, I have had patients, when seeing a close up image of a tooth I’ve told them has a problem, say: “Doc, why didn’t you tell me my tooth looked like this? “ l laugh and tell them that I in fact did! The difference with intraoral (in the mouth) digital photography is that now they could see it too!
Thank you for reading this blog. If there is a topic you‘d like more information on, please feel free to email my office at info@drblazer.com. And be sure to visit my “digital” website, www.drblazer.com