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Dear Dr. Hall, I have patch tested positive to many metals and chemicals. I had a root canal 5 years ago that got botched and the file was broken. I then went to an endodontist and he tried to go through the top to remove the file, but ending up going through the bottom and cutting. It has never felt right and I went to a dentist who said I had an infection under it. I was diagnosed also by allergist at my local university hospital with TILT, same thing as multiple chemical sensitivity. I know I have allergies to dental cement, formaldehyde, cobalt, chromium, titanium, and many chemicals. Right now I have very bad eczema from all allergies, but I am in pain and just want this root canal tooth pulled and cultured to see what type of infection it is. I am looking for a dentist. I will travel for someone knowledgeable on type IV metal allergies. Could you help me? Thank you, Lisa, I don’t think you necessarily need a dentist trained in your specific allergies, and I don’t know that there is any such dentist. What you need, I think, is a dentist willing to work with you and to work around the list of allergies that you have. And I think for that, you need to call around and ask offices if they are willing to do that. When I was in practice, I was willing to work with people with multiple sensitivities, and I would have some of them come to me with a list of dental products that they were sensitive to. These were Clifford tests. They are controversial, and I didn’t want to get into the controversy, but I would honor the findings of the doctor that had run the tests, and we would avoid all of those materials for which the patient tested sensitive. I know from interviewing many dentists that most are not willing to deal with issues like that, but a few are. In the dental marketing that I do, when a dentist is willing to work with those Cliffords tests, we market them as holistic dentists. I can think of a couple of dentists I know who are within reasonable driving distance (2-4 hours) for you who might be willing to accommodate you. If you’d like me to call and ask, let me know, and I’ll get back to you. Or another option would be to run a search yourself in Google for dentists who hold themselves out as holistic. And then call the office and tell them about your problems and see if they’re willing to work with you. Thanks, Do you have a comment? We’d love to hear from you. Enter your comment below. Click here to ask Dr. Hall a question of your own. |
About David A. Hall
Dr. David A. Hall was one of the first 40 accredited cosmetic dentists in the world. He practiced cosmetic dentistry in Iowa, and in 1990 earned his accreditation with the American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry. He is now president of Infinity Dental Web, a company in Mesa, Arizona that does advanced internet marketing for dentists.