Root Canals: At the Root of Much Disease?
Over 20 million root canal surgeries are done each year in the U.S. alone. I unfortunately have had two of them, before I knew that I had any other option. Dr. James Howenstine says, “Many chronic diseases, perhaps most, are a result of root canal surgery.”
This week I’ve been studying literature on cancer clinics in Germany and Switzerland to see if I want to visit any of them. Dr. Rau of the clinic Paracelsus, said that 147 out of 150 breast cancer patients had root-canal infected teeth on the meridian that includes the breast. Of non-breast cancer patients, only 35 percent had root canals on that meridian.
A root canal is done to “save” a deeply infected dead tooth that would otherwise have to be removed. You have 3 miles of tubules in every tooth, so it is not believable if a dentist says he cleaned and sterilized everything before capping the dead tooth. Bacteria, viruses, yeasts, fungi, and molds, are then trapped there.
White blood cells do not travel so deep. These organisms, then, morph to learn to live in the absence of oxygen, causing all kinds of health problems. Dr. Hal Huggins writes of those pleomorphic organisms becoming thio-ethers, the strongest poisons on the planet that are not radioactive.
Dr. Weston A. Price most famously discovered that if you implant a diseased tooth in an animal, that animal develops the diseases of the host. Other experts have written extensively about the problem of leaving a dead tooth in the mouth and sterilizing and packing some of the channels but not others.
Most of the research I have seen linking root canals to a phenomenal amount of seemingly unrelated disease is indirect, such as what I quoted from Dr. Rau above. It predominantly notes that those found to have a variety of diseases have a much higher-than-average rate of root canals. Though the links are indirect, there are many of them—it seems unwise to me to ignore them.
Medical and dental sources you may wish to consult confirming what I’m writing about today are Dr. Weston Price, Dr. Karen Shrimplin, Dr. Frank Jerome, Dr. Josef Issels, Dr. James Howenstine, Dr. Hal Huggins, and Dr. George Meinig (author of The Root Canal Cover-up, summarizing the 1200 pages of published work by Dr. Price).
I recently met a woman at my lecture in Mesa, Arizona, who was covered with horrible-looking lesions. She described it as an auto-immune condition. This woman was clearly miserable. She said she ate no gluten. No sugar. No dairy. She was doing everything right. I asked her, “How many root canals have you had?” She said, “I don’t know, a lot! Four at least?”
I met another woman in Atlanta—same basic story. She had driven hours to be there. She eats a very clean diet and even makes her own probiotic foods, and that’s probably the only reason she is alive. Because she is miserable and very ill with several diagnoses. I asked her how many root canals she had, and she said EIGHT.
No one had ever made the connection between root canals (and toxic, unbound metals in the mouth) to medical conditions, for either of these women! My friend Holly, a competitive tennis player at my club, just had a biological dentist remove her sister’s root canal tooth. Who knows if that’s why Holly’s lovely, young sister with three small children has been diagnosed with Stage 3 ALS that is currently crippling her….but Holly says the symptoms began a year after the root canal.
And what your dentist or endodontist won’t tell you is that the EXPECTED time that a root canal lasts is a max of 10 years. A “failed” root canal means that there are visible, discernible signs of rampant infection and decay. But those pleomorphic organisms trapped in an anaerobic environment, in a dead organ, are not really contained during that 10 years anyway.
If you want alternatives to root canals, fluoride, and amalgam fillings, or if you want your amalgam fillings removed, you may wish to find a holistic dentist, also known as a biological dentist.
They have departed from the protocols of dentistry’s “standard of care” because they observed and self-educated to understand how devastating what they WERE doing is, for their patients, and then they sought out additional training to practice in far more helpful, more holistic procedures.
It’s hard to imagine why the ADA would continue to insist that amalgam (mercury) fillings are safe and that root canals are good, safe, and necessary. But we have to realize that the entire dental industry would crumble under the weight of hundreds of billions of dollars of liability, if the dental industry admitted how deadly their practices over the past 50+ years have been!
This is worth paying attention to, my friends.
Posted in: Dental Health, Detox, Health Concerns
Hi Robyn…thanks for this very helpful post. When you talk about the DMSO, do you mean 1 part DMSO (as it comes from the bottle from VitaCost or wherever) in 3 parts water?
A note about drilling amalgam fillings: in Germany, dentist routinely protect the gums with plastic while they’re drilling. They basically use a rubber sheet and just have the tooth they’re working on exposed so none of the amalgam powder gets deposited in the gums or travels down the digestive tract. Out of 5 or 6 American dentists I’ve spoken to, nobody had ever heard of this. So if you’re going to have amalgam fillings drilled, ask your dentist to research this (may need to learn German :))
A couple of years ago,my dentist suspected there was something going on with one of my back teeth above the gum level even though nothing showed on an x-ray and I had no pain. He referred me to a specialist a few hrs drive away for me… ended up missing the appt. A couple of years later and with some new hi-tech x-ray and dental equipment he recommended that we should investigate further with a possibility of replacing the filling or doing a root canal if required even though I was still having no pain or any indication that there was anything wrong with the tooth. So up under the gum he went. After he got in, he told me he could not save the tooth…. nothing to drill into… so he extracted the tooth. After he got the tooth out, he was amazed to find that one horn (not sure if that’s the right word– each root is in 3 parts) of the root of the tooth was completely missing and the nerve was exposed. He couldn’t believe I hadn’t been in excruciating pain previous to this…. I can only surmise that my attention to my health using lots of greens, proper diet, lots of coconut oil, and oil of oregano when required for other issues had something to do with the lack of pain???? After reading your article am pleased that it didn’t go the root canal route. Unfortunate though that I am now missing a back tooth… however…. Am also now noticing that in the short period of time since having the tooth extracted, a number of food intolerances which I had been experiencing the past several years are beginning to lessen. Am hoping that is only the beginning of resolving some issues which I’ve been dealing with for several years.
I had NO idea! Unfortunately, I’ve also had root canals. :0( Looking forward to hearing what alternatives exist. Thank you for the information!
This all makes sense, but I finished reading this, and now I’m all stressed out. Tell me if I’m wrong here, but this is the path my brain is following after reading this…
You find yourself with an infected tooth, and the dentist is recommending a root canal. You don’t have the root canal and have the tooth removed instead. Veneers cannot cover a missing tooth, so you’d have to get a bridge put in or a dental implant. I’m pretty sure all of those things are considered “cosmetic” dentistry and wouldn’t be covered by insurance — I doubt they’d cover those costs just because you refused the recommended root canal.
It is frustrating because for the average person one a budget, there are no real options here. I don’t think most people have a few thousand dollars sitting around to pay for an implant (my dentist charges $3,000 – I don’t know if that is standard though). So, since you can’t leave the infected too IN, if you can’t afford the implant you’re basically forced to choose between having a missing tooth or getting the stupid root canal since it would be mostly or partially covered by dental insurance. My particular insurance covers 80% of root canals, so at the $900 my dentist charges I would pay just $180. For people without dental insurance at all, $900 is still a lot less than $3,000.
Am I jumping to conclusions here? Are there other options?? And maybe the moral of the story is to just keep my (and my kids’) teeth healthy so we never have to deal with this!
I had a route canal done 2 years ago, and I have had swollen glands, stuffiness in my ear and head and discomfort ever since. My internist can’t figure it out and I just try to live with it. The problems are on the side where the route canal was done. How do you plan to handle the two route canals you have? Is there any way to help alleviate the problem without extracting the tooth? I mean, following your recommendations above, would that make a big difference even if I kept the tooth? Or do you believe it is imperative to have it removed? Thanks!!
Great series of posts, Robyn! Thank you for the great info, I can’t wait for the ACS.
About what Nathalie said about the rubber sheet, yes make sure the dentist you see to remove amalgams uses a rubber dam or something so you are not exposed to more mercury when you are getting them out. Seek out a dentist that takes this precaution. I asked my dentist and he said they got in the way and he didn’t believe in the dangers of mercury anyway. Because of that I sought out a holistic dentist/naturopath in my state and found one that I LOVE. In fact, I had a whole bunch of cavities that my local dentist told me needed fillings for which he wanted an outrageous amount of money so I said no thank you. I traveled several hours to the holistic dentist and he told me most of my cavities would “heal” (imagine that!) and that the rest he could fill and take out my amalgams safely all for less money than my local dentist quoted me just for the fillings. He also told me if you eat a plant-based, gluten free, sugar free diet that you will have healthy teeth and gums. I can’t say enough about him. He practices in the Pacific Northwest but he has patients come from all over the US. His website has a lot of good information and alternatives to root canals etc. http://idahonaturaldentist.com/
Lastly, I found a “toothpaste” made from essential oils about 6 months ago and have been using it with great results. I have recessed gums and this product has taken away all the pain and tenderness. http://www.orawellness.com. When I ran out and had to use regular toothpaste before I ordered more, it was like night and day difference. My mouth was like, “What are you doing putting this artificial stuff in my mouth? Go back to the oils.” So I did!
My husband is a Dentist, so I have to be careful how I skirt around this issue, but I was able to help my daughter with a huge molar cavity (very visible to the naked eye and diagnosed with X-rays) by using an herbal poultice made with Dr. Christophers Tooth and Gum powder (purchased online at http://www.mynaturalmarket.com) and a tea tree oil mouthrinse that I made by adding 10 drops tea tree oil into 2 ounces water and having her swish it around for 1 minute, focusing on the tooth with the cavity after she had the poultice on for 20 minutes. I did this 2 times a day for a week, and the cavity disappeared. Adding Complete Tissue and Bone Capsules to the routine for a month can really help as well.
No dentist schooled in the U. S. has “never heard of a plastic sheet” because it is called a rubber dam and is used in many dental procedures including root canals. Also, most insurance companies will pay their percentage of having amalgam fillings replaced with composite fillings if the appropriate amount of time has elapsed since they fillings were originally done and the limitations of the insurance contract with the employer. Sometimes a person just gets some replaced then more in 6 months etc..The insurance company usually does not ask if it is cosmetic in this situation but of course would have to be truthful if asked. In my 32 years as a dental hygienist I am thinking back on my patients who have had breast cancer and I would say that I have not seen a correlation in root canals and breast cancer, and even in my own family, the ones I have seen with breast cancer have NOT had root canals. I personally would have one if it meant saving a tooth. The tubules are not necessarily sterilized all the way through, but the inside of the tooth is filled and sealed.
Hi Robyn, Are you going to have your root canals removed?
Dr. Marc Flack removed my amalgam fillings in the 1990’s, but that Dr. Flack died suddenly a number of years ago. He was a leader in the fight against the use of fluoride and of amalgam fillings. I just did a quick Internet search and couldn’t find a current listing for a dentist by that name in Salt Lake City.
Hmmm . . . .all of this is very interesting to me, as my husband just came back from the dentist with a recommendation to go to a periodontist. Apparently he has a tooth with a cracked filling and there is a big infection there.
That said, I read in the book “Be Your Own Doctor” by Rachel Weaver that using black walnut powder on your teeth can heal cavities. I haven’t tried it yet, but I think we’ll order some and have it on hand. I believe there is black walnut powder in Doctor Christopher’s tooth powder.
Thanks for the articles on dental health. I have had 2 root canals and ended up having to have both teeth removed at later dates, plus was left with a lot of health problems from them, so I can definitely identify w/ a lot of what’s being said here.
Will you let your readers know when the ACS is available in your store? I’ve not heard of that product before…..maybe because, as you mentioned, you normally need to get it from a doctor.
Just wanted to chime in that I have been to Dr. robertson and he is really good. he is highly trained and implements his training with great care. He is very, very thorough with every tooth. I recommend him highly. I don’t have time to explain all his training and methodology, but look up his web site to read about it or call his office.
Have all of your root canals taken out? Then replace with an implant or bridge? I somehow think you have a problem with them as well. By the way, when you had your amalgom fillings removed 10 years ago, you introduced more mercury into you system than would have ever been introduced by leaving them in there. You also increased your risk for needing a root canal by removing them. Sounds like no teerh and no fillings are the answer. Good luck