The Gentle Dentist Discusses Emergency Dental Care

January 31, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Hi, this is Dr. Antolak from The Gentle Dentist in Shelby Township, Michigan. What I’d like to do is speak to you about emergency dental care. At our office, we try to make ourselves available to those people who are having dental emergencies. And normally, dental emergencies happen at the most inopportune time. So if you’re trying to reach us during off hours we’ll definitely get back with you as soon as we can.

Dental emergencies are basically two or three different types of emergencies. One is traumatic, and that is if you get into accidents of some sort where you can break off your tooth and then you see either have that repaired or if you have an emergency with tooth actually falls out. Rinse that out and place it right back into that socket that where it came from. That’s the best of taking care of your problem with that. The other type of dental emergencies that we do have are when someone has had a filling missing or a big hole in the mouth. And all of a sudden, the thing develops into a bad toothache. Well that toothache is from the bacteria that’s in the mouth getting to the nerve. And then it goes from the nerve into the bone. And as it gets into the bone, it creates an infection, and that infection creates pressure inside of the jawbone. And that’s a dental emergency that gets that taken care of.

And the third type’s is where you normally see is where somebody has gum disease and they have bone loss around their teeth. Well they might get some food caught in that area or even around wisdom teeth, where food gets caught in that area, and blows the wisdom teeth up. It hurts and then they have to have something to deal with the pain. There’s a few different ways of dealing with emergencies that do take place over the counter remedies are obviously pretty limited.  But the most important thing is to get the dentist as quickly as possible.

So, if you have an emergency and you can wait to go to the dentist. We’d love to see you. Give us a call at 586-247-3500. If it’s a true emergency, and needs immediate attention, you might want to get to your local hospital call them.

Thank you and have a blessed day.

Filed Under: Dental Emergencies, Dental Videos Tagged With: , ,

The Gentle Dentist- Sensitive Teeth

January 30, 2012 by · Leave a Comment


Hi, my name is Jessica, and I’m a hygienist, and also the patient coordinator here at Dr. Antolak’s office, the Gentle Dentist in Shelby Township, Michigan. I’m here today to talk about a common dental problem, which is sensitive teeth. There are many reasons why people have sensitive teeth. It could be because of decay or many other reasons. And until you come in for an exam with Dr. Antolak, we will not know the exact reason. I’m here today to talk about dentin hypersensitivity. You might have seen it on a commercial on TV. But if not, I’m here to explain what it is.

It is a tooth problem that can affect over 40 million adults in the U.S. It usually affects people ages 20 to 49. But it can also affect teenagers and also older adults.  It’s caused by loss of enamel that shows the underlying layer in the tooth called dentin. And, here I have the diagram. This is what a tooth looks like on the inside. A cross-section of a tooth.  Here this white part that you can see when you see your teeth right here, is the enamel. Which you’re pretty familiar with, and also, it’s one of the strongest substances in the body. Underneath the enamel is the dentin, this yellow color, orange color right here. It is a very softer substance than the enamel. Underneath the dentine is where the nerves and blood vessels lie.

So, dentin hypersensitivity occurs if you have receding gums or a loss of enamel. And, the reason you experience a sensitivity is because, in the dentin, are tubules and so, if something that’s hot or cold, acidic, any other stimulus, hits the dentin, it’s more than likely to make an impulse that’s going to excite the nerves in the tooth. And you’ll get sensitive or painful teeth.

So what can you do if you do have this problem? We have many options here at Dr. Antolak’s office. One thing we might recommend for you is a tooth paste that contains potassium nitrate which is found in sensodyne or other sensitive toothpaste.

What potassium nitrate does, is it blocks the nerve impulse. So that will decrease sensitivity that you might experience. We also have a new product here at our office called MI Paste. It’s a milk based product that contains calcium. So if you’re allergic to milk, you cannot use this. It reminds me, actually of a yogurt. And it helps to remineralize your teeth.

Call us at our office at 586-247-3500  or visit our website at thegentledentist.com

Thank you

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Dr. Antolak Discusses The Pulse Oximeter

January 29, 2012 by · Leave a Comment


Hi, this is Dr. Antolak and Jessica from thegentledentist.com, we’re in Shelby Township, Michigan. And our phone number is (586) 247-3500. You’re probably wondering what I’m doing with this. This is called a pulse oximeter. We use this device when we provide oral sedation to our patients. What it does is it has the ability to detect the blood pressure, the oxygen saturation, the oxygen that’s in your blood and your, your heart rate. So what I’ll have Jessica do is first of all put on the blood pressure cuff and this is all automated and so this goes on like that and then also we have what’s called a pulse oximeter and through this device, there’s a little red light there and what that does is that red light that’s in there measures through your skin and through your nail bed.

The amount of oxygen, don’t ask me how it does it, it just does it. Through the oxygen through there. So, Justin you could go ahead and push the start button.  And what it’s going to do is it’s going to inflate the blood pressure cuff. And it does it automatically, which is very nice. And that way, we can see our patients, and treat them throughout the whole process, then we can monitor the blood pressure. We actually have probably around 6 or 8 different patients. We’ve been able to screen them and find out that they had high blood pressure that they didn’t know of. I mean serious high blood pressure. So this is 1 of the parts that we do during our initial visits to provide a screening exam for that.

What way if somebody does have high blood pressure you can send them to a physician and then they’ll know.  If they do, then we try to do some things to help calm them down. At the same time, we want to make sure that their pulse rate doesn’t slow down too much, or their blood pressure doesn’t go down too low. So we just have a good estimate.  The good thing is when they do oral sedation, it’s very safe and very effective when people, when they leave and I call them later on that evening many times they don’t even have any clue or memory of, of the procedure that was done with them. This is once again is a very.

One of the ways that we try to provide the most safety that we can for our patients, and a way that keeps us, just more in touch with modern technology. So if you’re interested in oral sedation, if you have the fear of the dentist. Well, we can help relax you with basically a couple of pills that you take.

Give us a call. And our phone number is (586) 247-3500, or visit thegentledentist.com. Thank you.

Filed Under: Dental Videos, Sedation Dentistry Tagged With: , , , ,
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