DentalBuzz: a jolt of current

trends, innovations, and quirks of dentistry

1939 – The year of the glowing wand

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Welcome to the latest edition of Timewarp Tuesdays, where you are NOT asked to click your heels three times, or threatened to have houses dropped on your relatives, or coerced to chant “there’s no place like home” because there was much more to 1939 than overbudget Hollywood films.

Like Tube Lights! There were tube lights, the precursors to fiber optics, in ginormous scale. Wands! To deliver light to the unlit crevices of orificies from Omaha to Oregon to Oz.

Click on the photo below to see this excerpt from the March 1939 issue of Popular Science in its full-size:

 

 This looks pretty amazing for the time, actually. And it makes me wonder if our isolites, our fiber-optic handpieces, our loupe-mounted headlights, and other super-LED tech will seem quaint in another 70 years. And if so, what will replace them? Teeth lit from the inside? A glowing pink ball that drops from the ceiling and slowly expands to fully illuminate the oral cavity?

In the end it’s about the power of the light, something that is essential for our practice. Maybe Glenda said it best back in 1939:

“You’ve always had the power, my dear. You’ve had it all along.”

 

 

SOPA in your mouth

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I have a soft spot in my heart for funny Engrish. Except when the person writing it has a blatant disrespect for patents, trademarks, and such. Isolite Systems has a slam-dunk product that has been previously featured here on DentalBuzz, and yes, we’ve even suggested that a clever hack was available which still gives the Isolite company a repeat source of income. There’s hacking, and then there’s design forgery.

 

This introductory email should sufficiently scare you away from even thinking about going to the dark side:

Dear Sir/Madam:

Good day! I am very pleasure to send you an E-mail to introduce our product– ISOlight Shining Suction! Pls check attachment. This product can bring a few of advantage for dentistry:

1. Work Faster, Brighter, Drier

ISOlight Shining Suction is with a continuous, powerful and shadowless illumination. Dentist can see it mach more clearly inside mouth, then they can work accurately and faster. The special design mouthpiece can supply a widely space for dentist. Operation become more convenience. This device can connect with high/low suction. then the water will go throuth mouthpiece and maintain mouth drier. The patient doesn’t need to get up the spit the water.

2. Shining Suction Stop Interruption and save more time, dentst can get more appointment

Base of the advantage, dentst can complete the operation faster and patient become more comfortable. EACH OPERATION WILL BE FAST 25%-30%. In the same working time, dentist can take more appointment and create more profit. In the same time, dentist and patient would not feel tried.

3.  Save Work

Shining Suction supply self-suction. Nurse doesn’t need to stay beside patient and hold high/low suction. She/he will be free to do the other assistance such as: mix the colophony and materail, clean the instrument, do autoclavable, pass and take the instrument etc. Then dentist can do operation more dedicated.

4. Safe

Special Mouthpiece will protect tongue and cheek. Patient will not be easy to get hurt.

5. Better Ergonomics

The ergonomic design of Shining Suction reduces fatigue and repetitive stress associated with retraction, suctioning, eyestrain, and motion spent adjusting headlights, overhead light or otherwise positioning the patient for better access or visibility.

6. Save Cost

The bright shining suction will supply the powerful light in mouth. Dentist doesn’t need to buy expensive fiber optic product, such as: Fiber optic handpice, fiber optic scaler, headlight, etc.

ISOlight Shining Suction is the new revolution dental product with many useful advantage. It will definitely help you increase your efficiency and profit. ISOlight will be your best assistant on your job.

If you have any question, pls feel free to contact me.

Do you still fight in the hard competition of old product? Do you still think about how to increase your business? Do you still warry about the profit reduce of old product? I think it is time to indraught ISOlight Shining Suction to help you.

For more detail and best distributor price, pls send E-mail to reference with your company detail.

Sincerely waitting for your reply. Have a nice day! Best regard

Kevin Guan, Export Manager, Codent Technology Co., Ltd

_________

If you ever see any other dental product knockoffs let us know here at DentalBuzz so we can “out” the dastardly company. SOPA and PIPA censoring isn’t the answer to problems like this on the internet. Awareness can only go so far, too. The real stand today has to be internal, so make sure that you continue to promote good enterprise instead of just free enterprise.

And it’s so hard for me to stand firm on my ethics because they make some REALLY CUTE HERMES BAG knockoffs out there! But I must stand up. For Isolite. And for every innovative company online that does its best to stay honest.

A free dental timer

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Dental materials have needs. Especially the need to be timed. Like, how long has that anesthetic been working? Or when will the alginate set?

Instead of having to remember all the working and set times for the products that you use every day, maybe what you need is a computer timer that’s specifically designed for dentistry.

Sure, you can use it for your operatory chess matches, timing how long your assistant was in the restroom, or reminding yourself to check the hygiene patient. But its best uses are definitely dental-centric.

Download the BlueMinder Dental Timer here for free. Doesn’t cost anything – no data, no money. Just install it at each clinical computer, tell your assistant to add your most-used dental materials (or just rely on the included materials library) and you can ditch the grey LCD clock boxes on your tray tables forever.

Or at least you can use it until the dental materials can time themselves.

 

HandPiece, Love and KaVo Happiness

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Forty-something years ago the US had a revolution that twisted the Mad Men-tality of societal standards. The shadow is all that’s left now: the 60’s are just another commodity that’s most visible in ‘tween fashions and feelgoody Volkswagen campaigns.

There’s probably a few Free Love dustbunnies that have survived by clumping together at Jimmy Buffett concerts (did all the Deadheads join the Parrotheads? are they all now DeadParrotHeads?). Anything else is marketing, which brings us to this Time Life Music parody video from KaVo. It’s not particularly inventive, but it has enough good characters and pretend song titles from the era to keep the average dental professional engaged. Oh, and you can sign up to try any KaVo handpiece for free:

 

 

Sorry that you can’t get those three minutes of your life back, but you have to admit that the gal singing “Take Another Little Piece of My Tooth” showed real talent and made most of it worthwhile. Also, patients shouldn’t be used as props. This one just stares at the dentist the whole time he’s talking…

Now go try a handpiece and show KaVo that their creative department really is doing its job so their employees will get more money and maybe the next video they make will be one that you DO share with everyone.

 

There’s an app for teeth bleaching

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By Trish Walraven

This picture was snapped at the local mall last week. If your Sephora shop is like ours, it has recently capitalized on its space across the mall from the Apple Store and is now targeting the same people who like to wear iPods around their necks. Glowy! White! Cords! Teeth? Hmmm.

I haven’t actually purchased the Glo™ system so the least I could do is to try to help sell a few of them with this exclusive “DentalBuzz How-To Guide for Avoiding the Dentist But Still Whiten Your Teeth a Tiny Bit.”

Step 1: Remind yourself that you really hate the dentist. And justify your reasons for not going to one by telling yourself that you brush every day with a toothpaste that you see advertised on TV. And mouthwash. You always use mouthwash, because it protects your teeth. So you don’t need a dentist.

Step 2: Save up $275. This is very important because you can’t get white teeth for free, no matter how much you see it offered by area dentists as a special for new patients. It’s NOT FREE. Also, make sure not to read up on any scientific studies about how light-activated or heat-activated whitening is no more effective than bleaching gel alone. Or that dentists use bleaching gel that is usually more than triple the strength of the strongest OTC whitener available. None of that matters because you are going to do this yourself with your own hard-earned money. Besides, insurance doesn’t cover whitening anyway so that’s one more way that a dentist won’t be ripping you off.

Step 3: Purchase the Glo Brilliant™ Personal Teeth Whitening Device at the place of your choice, either at Home Shopping Network, or Sephora, or directly from GloScience. And then justify the purchase one more time because the company has “science” in their name, after all.

Step 4: This is the most fun step! Take all of the stuff out of the kit and marvel over it. SPOILER ALERT! I’m going to tell you what you get:

•A lighted mouthpiece that comes with its own case!
•10 G-Vials! Futuristic-looking smearable 6% hydrogen peroxide gel tubes with built in brushes. G-Vials. Sounds kinky.
•The Glo™ Control. It’s so three generations of iPods ago….but….FOR TEETH!
•A Charging Dock! Docking is fun. And a Music Player! (just kidding, no music)
•A USB power plug. It plugs into your computer! And its for your teeth! (you should be squealing by now with joy).
•Glo™ Lip Balm. Because hydrogen peroxide is caustic.
•a BAG!!!! To carry it all in! Because you want to be able to whiten your teeth at your mom’s, while you’re driving to your job interview, or wherever you have an urge to wear the GloControl around your neck.

Step 5: Check to see that the GloControl is charged and hang it around your neck. You wouldn’t want to be putting the mouthpiece in your mouth all dark, now, would you? Also, apply a thin layer of the lip balm on your lips, and pout, because you’re too cute to get burned.

Step 6: Open one of the G-Vials and squeeze it until the gel appears on the brush (ooh. higher. Higher. There.). Brush the gel onto the fronts of teeth, taking care not to slobber on them.

Step 7: Plug in the mouthpiece, press the GLO button, unhinge your jaw and then cram the mouthpiece all the way in until it covers both your top and bottom teeth. Watch this video if you think I’m exaggerating.

Step 8: Spend the next eight minutes going about your day. This is verbatim from the GloScience website. Then you’ll want to immediately do Step 6 through Step 8 three more times, for 32 consecutive minutes per day. One G-Vial per day for ten days.

Step 9: Marvel at how much whiter your teeth are! You’ll probably notice a change, and hopefully the bleaching will last longer than a month, but if it doesn’t, just repeat Step 1 over and over until you feel better. And then buy some G-Vial refills. You know how you like your G-Vials.

Do you remember what came before this in the mall? The chairs, the lights, the kiosks, the leased-out spaces with people parading around in white lab coats? I think that this is a change for the good, and because the treatment course is similar to that recommended by dentists, it probably is much more effective. Well, except for the light. But then no one could charge so much just for the bleach and the tray?

Here’s to the power of bling.

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