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Winter 2017 (Volume 6, Issue 1)
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Introduction
Happy New Year! I hope everyone’s year is off to a great start. I can’t believe another year has come and gone and that we are starting Volume 6 of Endodontic Spotlight. Since we’ve been doing this for a number of years and not everyone received the initial issues, I’m going to again highlighting some of the more classic articles that we covered previously in the early years. This paper, by Kakehashi, Stanley and Fitzgerald, is generally considered the most important publication in endodontics and shows that bacteria are ultimately responsible for endodontic problems. We also have a fun little story from the Seattle Met magazine about my father and me at the Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium!
Kakehashi S, Stanley HR, Fitzgerald RJ. The effect of surgical exposure of dental pulps in germ-free and conventional laboratory rats. Oral Surg Oral Med Oral Pathol 1965;20:340-9.
This is perhaps the most important article in the classical endodontic literature. Although it may seem obvious today, this landmark study from 1965 demonstrated the important role that bacteria play in endodontic disease. The authors created pulp exposures in the molars of normal and germ-free rats, and then analyzed the teeth histologically after a few weeks. In the normal animals with bacteria, all had complete pulp necrosis, inflammation and abscess formation. In contrast, in the animals without bacteria, vital tissue and dentinal bridging was present and abscesses were not found.
SUMMARY: Bacteria play a critical role in endodontic disease.
Seattle Met Article
I also wanted to share a fun little story in the Seattle Met magazine’s Top Dentists 2017 feature about my father and me volunteering at the Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium! https://www.seattlemet.com/articles/2017/1/1/what-goes-on-at-the-dentists-office-behind-the-scenes
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