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Did Dr. Price have it right when he put out his research on infected root canals and the focal infection theory nearly 100 years ago?\u00a0 Over the next few weeks, I will be reviewing some basic positions on root canals and their effect on systemic health.\u00a0 I’m often asked by my patients whether it’s better to get a root canal vs an extraction.\u00a0 I will be attempting to answer this question by taking a deep dive into the research.\u00a0 However, I will not just be looking at one side of the issue.\u00a0 I will be looking at it from all angles and summarizing what opposing sides have to say about this hotly contested\u00a0subject.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n Needless to say, opinions vary wildly from one extreme to the other.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0If you talk to most dentists, they will tell you that Dr. Price had it wrong.\u00a0 If you talk to most alternative health practitioners like chiropractors, naturopaths and integrative M.D.’s, they would tell\u00a0you that, yes, Price had it right.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n So, who should you listen to and believe?\u00a0<\/span> First of all, let me say that I am sympathetic to the confusion out there as to what to do about root canals and infected teeth.\u00a0 Most dentists and endodontists (root canal specialists) will say that it’s usually best to save teeth with root canals and that anyone who says differently is just plain uneducated and misinformed.<\/p>\n On the other side, you have the holistic and alternative practitioners stating with great confidence that most root canals are bad and should be extracted.\u00a0 Some practitioners, like Dr. Mercola, even say that if you leave root canals in place that you will get cancer. So who are you supposed to believe, and even more importantly, if you have a root canal, what should you do about it if anything?<\/p>\n One dentist may say to do nothing and just watch it.\u00a0 Another dentist or endodontist may say, “Let’s retreat it as we may be able to get a better result and improve the situation.”\u00a0 A more holistic dentist or alternative practitioner may say, “I don’t think you are going to get better until you extract the tooth.”\u00a0 This can be quite frustrating as you may feel like you are stuck in the middle or all these ‘opinions’ and left with more questions than answers.<\/p>\n So who is this Dr. Weston Price anyway?<\/span><\/p>\n Weston Price was a dentist who was very well respected during his day, as head of the research arm of the American Dental Association from 1914-1928.\u00a0 Aside from being a practicing dentist, he did research on root canals and their contribution to systemic diseases.\u00a0 Through his research, he found that an infected tooth removed from a patient and transplanted under the skin of a rabbit caused the same or similar disease that the patient had been suffering from, and later the lab animal would frequently die.\u00a0 He also observed that many times his patients got better after the offending tooth had been removed (extracted).<\/p>\n He was able to reproduce this result with different patients suffering from different systemic diseases and maladies.\u00a0 Therefore, he postulated that it was something in the infected tooth that was causing the disease, as he was able to predictably reproduce the disease just by transferring the tooth from host to animal.\u00a0 From his research and direct observations with patients, Dr. Price came up with the term ‘Focal Infection Theory’ to explain this phenomenon, a term that is still being used today to describe an infection in one area of the body affecting or causing an infection in another part of the body.<\/p>\n Dr. Price’s research was revolutionary and very influential during his heyday.\u00a0 He was very respected by his peers and other doctors and held many educational meetings on topics as far reaching as dental imaging and root canals.\u00a0 \u00a0Today he is somewhat of a folk hero among alternative practitioners and other holistic health-minded people partly due to his focal infection theory and partly because of his work with nutrition.<\/p>\n Most dentists and endodontists disagree with Dr. Price’s research and the conclusions he reached.\u00a0 The people who tend to strongly agree with him are generally alternative practitioners and holistic\/biological dentists.<\/p>\n George Meinig, who helped to found the original association of endodontists back in the 50’s, wrote a complete review and analysis of Dr. Price’s research 25 years ago. However, if you bring up Weston Price or George Meinig’s book, “The Root Canal Cover-Up” with almost any general dentist or endodontist, they may roll their eyes and label you as another one of those ‘crazy’ patients.\u00a0 I will write more about George Meinig in another post.\u00a0 However, to understand why Dr. Price’s research is not more widely known, all one has to do is go talk to your neighborhood dentist or search the website of the American Association of Endodontists (AAE for short).<\/p>\n While plenty of good information is available online from the AAE and\u00a0<\/em>other reliable resources, patients sometimes arrive in the dental office with\u00a0<\/em>misinformation. This has occurred with the long-dispelled \u201cfocal infection\u00a0<\/em>theory\u201d in endodontics, introduced in the early 1900s. In <\/em>the 1920s, Dr.\u00a0<\/em>Weston A. Price presented research suggesting that bacteria trapped in\u00a0<\/em>dentinal tubules during root canal treatment could \u201cleak\u201d and cause almost\u00a0<\/em>any type of degenerative systemic disease (e.g., arthritis; diseases of the\u00a0<\/em>kidney, heart, nervous, gastrointestinal, endocrine and other systems). This\u00a0<\/em>was before medicine understood the causes of such disease.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Dr. Price advocated tooth extraction\u2014the most traumatic dental procedure\u2014\u00a0<\/em>over endodontic treatment. This theory resulted in a frightening era of tooth\u00a0<\/em>extraction both for treatment of systemic disease and as a prophylactic measure\u00a0<\/em>against future illness. Dr. Price\u2019s research techniques were criticized at the time\u00a0<\/em>they were published, and by the early 1930s, a number of well-designed studies\u00a0<\/em>using more modern research techniques discredited his findings.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Decades of research have contradicted Dr. Price\u2019s findings since then. In\u00a0<\/em>1951, the Journal of the American Dental Association published a special\u00a0<\/em>edition reviewing the scientific literature and shifted the standard of practice\u00a0<\/em>back to endodontic treatment for teeth with non-vital pulp in instances\u00a0<\/em>where the tooth could be saved. The JADA reviewed Dr. Price\u2019s research\u00a0<\/em>techniques from the 1920s and noted that they lacked many aspects of\u00a0<\/em>modern scientific research, including <\/em>absence of proper control groups\u00a0<\/em>and induction of excessive doses of bacteria.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u2022 As recently as 2013, a study published in a journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA\u00a0<\/em>Otolaryngology\u2014Head & Neck Surgery) found that a patient\u2019s risk of cancer doesn\u2019t change after\u00a0<\/em>having a root canal treatment; in fact, patients with multiple endodontic treatments had a 45\u00a0<\/em>percent reduced <\/em>risk of cancer.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u2022 The only alternative to endodontic treatment is <\/em>extraction of the tooth. Extraction is a traumatic\u00a0<\/em>procedure and is known to cause a significantly higher incidence of bacteria entering the\u00a0<\/em>bloodstream.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n There is no valid, scientific evidence linking root canal-treated teeth and disease elsewhere in the\u00a0<\/em>body. Data showing that \u201c97 percent of cancer patients had root canal treatment\u201d has not been\u00a0<\/em>published anywhere. There is no causality between root canals and cancer; just because a person\u00a0<\/em>has experienced both doesn\u2019t mean a cause-and-effect relationship exists.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Here is another statement from the AAE directly addressing root canals and the focal infection theory.<\/p>\n \u00a0More recent research continues to support the safety of dental treatment as it relates to overall systemic health. In 2007, the American Heart Association updated its guidelines on the prevention of infective endocarditis, drastically curbing the indications for premedication for dental procedures and excluding endodontic treatment from dental procedures requiring premedication.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n In April 2012, the AHA found no scientific evidence linking periodontal disease and heart disease, concluding that heart disease and periodontal disease often coincidentally occur in the\u00a0same person due to common risk factors of smoking, age <\/em>and diabetes mellitus.<\/em> Decades of research contradict the beliefs of \u201cfocal infection\u201d proponents;\u00a0there is no valid, scientific evidence linking endodontically treated teeth and systemic disease.<\/strong>\u00a0Yet some patients still hear about this long-dispelled theory.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Please see the end of this article for many of the research papers that endodontists and the AAE list to support these positions (1-22).<\/p>\n Dr O’s Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n 15 million root canals are performed in the United States every year and it’s important to have a balanced view of these issues because root canals became the standard approach for treating infected teeth since the 80’s.\u00a0 Over time root canals often do become re-infected, sometimes without symptoms.\u00a0 Statistics about the general success rate of root canal procedures vary, however it’s likely that 30 – 40% of them fail and require re-treatment or extraction.<\/p>\n It’s important to have an understanding of the options available, so in the weeks to follow I am going to do delve into this issue from both sides of the argument, pro,\u00a0and con.\u00a0 However, if you would like to get to the bottom line on how I handle root canals and infected teeth, you can go immediately to another article I have on the subject:\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Should I Treat My Root Canal Infection or Extract my Tooth?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n I have a lot of respect for the AAE and endodontists and all their hard work to save teeth.\u00a0 Root canals are not easy to do and these specialists get the toughest cases.\u00a0 They have a hard job.<\/p>\n First of all, I agree with the AAE that there is no way to prove that root canals cause cancer, as cancer is a multifactorial disease.<\/p>\n However, I’m not sure the research they list really proves that bacteria from these root canal teeth are safe and do not cause problems.<\/p>\n There is also research that disagrees with the AAE’s position that ‘root canals are perfectly safe and that there is no valid, scientific evidence linking endodontically treated teeth and systemic disease.’\u00a0<\/em> I will list and discuss some of this research in my next article.\u00a0 Stay tuned.<\/p>\n If you can’t wait till my next article, you can click on the link below to find out more about how I treat root canals:\u00a0\u00a0How to Resolve a Root Canal Infection \u2013 A Paradigm Shift<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n Here are the references listed by endodontists to disprove the focal infection:<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Did Dr. Price have it right when he put out his research on infected root canals and the focal infection theory nearly 100 years ago?\u00a0 Over the next few weeks, I will be reviewing the seminal work on root canals and how they affect systemic health.\u00a0 I\u2019m often asked by my patients whether it\u2019s better to get a root canal vs an extraction.\u00a0 I will be attempting to answer this question by taking a deep dive into the research.\u00a0 However, I will not just be looking at one side of the issue.\u00a0 I will be looking at it from all angles and summarizing what opposing sides have to say about this hotly contested subject within dentistry vs alternative health world.\u00a0 Needless to say, opinions vary wildly from one extreme to the other.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4885,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":" Did Dr. Price have it right when he put out his research on infected root canals and the focal infection theory nearly 100 years ago?\u00a0 Over the next few weeks, I will be reviewing the seminal work on root canals and how they affect systemic health.\u00a0 I'm often asked by my patients whether it's better to get a root canal vs an extraction.\u00a0 I will be attempting to answer this question by taking a deep dive into the research.\u00a0 However, I will not just be looking at one side of the issue.\u00a0 I will be looking at it from all angles and summarizing what opposing sides have to say about this hotly contested subject within dentistry vs alternative health world.\u00a0 Needless to say, opinions vary wildly from one extreme to the other.<\/span><\/p> If you talk to most dentists and the Association of Endodontists (AAE for short), they would tell you definitely not.\u00a0 If you talk to most alternative health practitioners like chiropractors, naturopaths and integrative M.D.'s, they would tell\u00a0you that, yes, Price had it right.\u00a0 So, who should you listen to and believe?\u00a0<\/span><\/p> First of all, let me say that I am sympathetic to the confusion out there as opinions vary wildly about what to do about root canals or infected teeth.\u00a0 On one hand you have the dentists and endodontists (root canal specialists) who say that most teeth should be saved with root canals and anyone who says differently is just plain uneducated and misinformed.<\/p> On the other hand you have the holistic and alternative practitioners stating with great confidence that most root canals are bad and should be extracted.\u00a0 Some practitioners, like Dr. Mercola, even say that if you leave root canals in place that you will get cancer.<\/p> So who are you supposed to believe, and even more importantly, if you have a root canal, what should you do about it if anything?\u00a0 This can be quite frustrating as opinions are all over the map.\u00a0 One dentist may say to do nothing and just watch it.\u00a0 Another dentist or endodontist may say let's retreat it as we may be able to get a better result and improve the situation.\u00a0 A more holistic dentist or alternative practitioner may say let's pull or extract the tooth.\u00a0 This can be quite frustrating as you, the patient, may feel like you are stuck in the middle or all these 'opinions' and left with more quesitons than answers.<\/p> In the weeks to follow I am going to do a deep dive into this issue from both sides of the argument, both pro and con.\u00a0 However, if you would like to get to the bottom line and how I handle root canals and infected teeth, you can go immediately to my other articles on the subject:<\/p> Should I Treat My Root Canal Infection or Extract my Tooth?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>If Weston Price is so visionary, why isn’t he more well known?<\/h2>\n
What Endodontists and the AAE have to say about Dr. Price’s work.<\/em><\/h2>\n
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