{"id":2394,"date":"2016-03-03T12:39:05","date_gmt":"2016-03-03T19:39:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/?p=2394"},"modified":"2016-03-07T13:10:34","modified_gmt":"2016-03-07T20:10:34","slug":"sensationalizing-dental-studies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/sensationalizing-dental-studies\/","title":{"rendered":"Sensationalizing medical and dental studies"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p><script>\/\/ <![CDATA[\n(function(d, s, id) {\n  var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];\n  if (d.getElementById(id)) return;\n  js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;\n  js.src = \"\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\";\n  fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);\n}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));\n\/\/ ]]><\/script><\/p>\n<table border=\"0\" width=\"100%\" cellpadding=\"5\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td valign=\"top\" width=\"40%\">\n<div align=\"center\">\n<table style=\"border-collapse: collapse;\" border=\"0\" width=\"350\" cellpadding=\"0\" bgcolor=\"#A9C5A5\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: small;\">We thank our advertisers who help fund this site.<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td align=\"center\"><script src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\" async=\"\"><\/script><!-- MyNewSmile sidebar tall --> <ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 300px; height: 600px;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-4419877247826466\" data-ad-slot=\"6363395985\"><\/ins><script>\/\/ <![CDATA[\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n\/\/ ]]><\/script><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<td>.<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s a lot of what I call medical and dental sensationalism that goes on in the online world. Shocking conclusions get traffic, and often they play to people&#8217;s biases. <\/p>\n<p>Some of this sensationalizing is relatively innocent, as people slightly embellish the conclusions of legitimate studies. I reported on this blog last week on a story based on a research article about the oral pH of people who sleep with their mouth open. The article hypothesized that mouth breathing might lead to enamel erosion or decay. Widespread reporting on the study glossed over that this was merely a hypothesis.<\/p>\n<p>Today I came across an article that is more of a designed attempt to promote an agenda. It comes from an online magazine, Uncommon Wisdom Daily, and the article is titled &#8220;Fluoride Classified as a Neurotoxin&#8221; by a writer named Brad Hoppman. It begins with the attention-grabbing statement: &#8220;The world\u2019s oldest and most-prestigious medical journal, The Lancet, has officially classified fluoride as a neurotoxin. This puts fluoride in the same category as arsenic, lead and mercury.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h2>Errors in the Article<\/h2>\n<p>I looked up the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thelancet.com\/journals\/laneur\/article\/PIIS1474-4422(13)70278-3\/fulltext\" target=\"_blank\">study referenced<\/a>, and uncovered a host of errors in their reporting of it. Let me list them.<\/p>\n<p>1. The Lancet is the world&#8217;s most prestigious medical journal.<br \/>\nThis is the beginning of the embellishment of the story. Yes, it&#8217;s a minor embellishment, but it gives us an idea of the mindset of the author. There is fairly widespread agreement that the New England Journal of Medicine is the <a href=\"https:\/\/dbiosla.org\/publications\/resources\/topten.html\" target=\"_blank\">world&#8217;s most prestigious medical journal<\/a>, probably followed by the Journal of the American Medical Association. But The Lancet is probably in the top five.<\/p>\n<p>2. The Lancet has officially classified fluoride . . .<br \/>\nThe Lancet is not an endorsement organ. It publishes scientific studies. In this case, it published a study that mentioned possible fluoride toxicity. There is no &#8220;official classification&#8221; going on here.<\/p>\n<p>3. . . . classified fluoride as a neurotoxin.<br \/>\nHere they are close, but again they are shading the truth. The study talked about &#8220;developmental neurotoxins,&#8221; which is different from &#8220;neurotoxins.&#8221; The difference is that the article discussed the effect of certain substances on developing human fetuses. Fetuses are especially sensitive, and some chemicals that would be perfectly safe for adults and children can damage unborn children.<\/p>\n<p>4. The study didn&#8217;t actually examine fluoride. The author of the study only referenced data available from China that showed that Chinese children residing in areas with high fluoride concentrations had slightly lower IQs than children in other areas, presumably in areas with normal fluoride concentrations. But Hoppman shades the results to implicate ALL fluoride, not elevated levels of fluoride.<\/p>\n<p>5. The conclusion of the study was that more research is needed &#8211; it wasn&#8217;t definitive.<br \/>\nThat is only fair, given the thinness of the correlation they found in these Chinese children. Maybe these communities in China had elevated fluoride in the water because they had poor water systems or the residents were poorly educated (hence the lower IQs of their children) or had other problems. Every serious scientific researcher understands the difference between establishing a correlation and establishing that one parameter causes the other. And since this research article only reported on these other studies, there is no opportunity here to critically examine those studies. That&#8217;s why the study author was rather tentative about his conclusions with regard to fluoride.<\/p>\n<h2>Stoking Fluoride Fear<\/h2>\n<p>So, with a generous amount of exaggeration, <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/tapwaterposter.jpg\" alt=\"stoking fluoride toxicity fears\" width=\"336\" height=\"371\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-2396\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/tapwaterposter.jpg 336w, https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/tapwaterposter-272x300.jpg 272w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 336px) 100vw, 336px\" \/>Hoppman helps stoke fears of fluoride. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/fluoride-in-supersmile-toothpaste\/\" target=\"_blank\">Fluoride<\/a>, let me repeat here, is a natural mineral that is present in most natural water sources. When I practiced in Iowa, I had patients from rural areas who had well water, and I would ask them to bring in samples of that water and send it in for analysis of its fluoride content. Every sample had some fluoride in it. And the research establishing that the presence of the mineral fluoride in water in certain very low concentrations helps during formative years to build teeth that are more decay-resistant, that research is solid. Unethical fear-mongerers like Hoppman cause their share of damage.<\/p>\n<p>The real poison in our drinking water is chlorine, and it&#8217;s curious that fear-mongerers like Hoppman choose instead to go after fluoride. Chlorine kills bacteria and other pathogens and is one one the reasons the water supplies in this country are among the safest in the world, but it is a poison. Fluoride, on the other hand, is a beneficial mineral nutrient.<\/p>\n<p>My recommendation&mdash;be at least slightly skeptical of every sensational-sounding news article addressing medical or dental information. Don&#8217;t stray from solidly established principles without repeated evidence from various sources.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Dr. Hall<\/p>\n<p>Do you have a comment? We&#8217;d love to hear from you. Enter your comment below.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border: currentColor; width: 450px; height: 80px; overflow: hidden;\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/like.php?href=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mynewsmile.com&amp;layout=standard&amp;show_faces=true&amp;width=450&amp;action=like&amp;colorscheme=light&amp;height=80\" width=\"300\" height=\"150\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Click here to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/askdr.htm\">ask Dr. Hall<\/a> a question of your own.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We thank our advertisers who help fund this site. . There&#8217;s a lot of what I call medical and dental sensationalism that goes on in the online world. Shocking conclusions get traffic, and often they play to people&#8217;s biases. Some of this sensationalizing is relatively innocent, as people slightly embellish the conclusions of legitimate studies. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[734,482,733,483,738,737,736,735],"class_list":{"0":"post-2394","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-preventive-dentistry","7":"tag-brad-hoppman","8":"tag-fluoride","9":"tag-fluoride-a-neurotoxin","10":"tag-fluoride-healthy","11":"tag-fluoride-toxicity","12":"tag-medical-sensationalism","13":"tag-the-lancet","14":"tag-uncommon-wisdom-daily","15":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Sensationalizing medical and dental studies - Cosmetic Dentistry Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/sensationalizing-dental-studies\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Sensationalizing medical and dental studies - Cosmetic Dentistry Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"We thank our advertisers who help fund this site. . There&#8217;s a lot of what I call medical and dental sensationalism that goes on in the online world. Shocking conclusions get traffic, and often they play to people&#8217;s biases. Some of this sensationalizing is relatively innocent, as people slightly embellish the conclusions of legitimate studies. [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/sensationalizing-dental-studies\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Cosmetic Dentistry Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-03-03T19:39:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-03-07T20:10:34+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/tapwaterposter.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"David A. 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Shocking conclusions get traffic, and often they play to people&#8217;s biases. Some of this sensationalizing is relatively innocent, as people slightly embellish the conclusions of legitimate studies. [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/sensationalizing-dental-studies\/","og_site_name":"Cosmetic Dentistry Blog","article_published_time":"2016-03-03T19:39:05+00:00","article_modified_time":"2016-03-07T20:10:34+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/tapwaterposter.jpg","type":"","width":"","height":""}],"author":"David A. Hall","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"David A. Hall","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/sensationalizing-dental-studies\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/sensationalizing-dental-studies\/"},"author":{"name":"David A. 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Hall","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4615c869fad982a8b037801e6bd5181b104e67228b9c0525d2ad490de1e7b78e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4615c869fad982a8b037801e6bd5181b104e67228b9c0525d2ad490de1e7b78e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4615c869fad982a8b037801e6bd5181b104e67228b9c0525d2ad490de1e7b78e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"David A. Hall"},"description":"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.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.infinitydentalweb.com"]}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2394","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2394"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2394\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2415,"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2394\/revisions\/2415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2394"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2394"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mynewsmile.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2394"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}