All posts tagged: dental

Neanderthals practiced dental care 59,000 years ago

Published by Jenni Sidey

A deep cavity in a single Neanderthal molar from Siberia looks less like random damage and more like a deliberate act of treatment, a finding that pushes invasive dental care far deeper into human history. The tooth, known as Chagyrskaya 64, came from Chagyrskaya Cave in Russia’s Altai region and dates to about 59,000 years ago. In a study published in PLOS One, Alisa Zubova of the Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography in St. Petersburg and colleagues argue that the tooth was not simply worn down by age, broken by chance, or altered after burial. Instead, they say, a Neanderthal appears to have drilled into a decayed molar to reach infected tissue and ease pain. That makes the specimen the oldest known evidence of successful dental treatment, and the first such case documented outside Homo sapiens. “We were intrigued by the unusual shape of the concavity on the tooth’s chewing surface,” Zubova said. “It differed from the normal morphology of the pulp chamber and did not match the typical pattern of carious …

Dentists Are Using AI to Scare Patients Into Unnecessary Dental Work, According to an Explosive Investigation

Published by José Betancourt

Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech Is your dentist upselling you on something? Does your old filling really need to be replaced, and is that tooth decay really bad enough to warrant new work? Such suspicions have probably crossed your mind before as you laid there in tense anticipation of the noisy drill about to send stomach-churning vibrations through your teeth, and they’re not going to go away once you hear about how dentists across the country are embracing AI tools. In her new book “I Am Not a Robot: My Year Using AI to Do (Almost) Everything,” former Wall Street Journal columnist Joanna Stern recalls how a routine trip to the dentist’s office led her to unearthing the disturbing way that AI is being used to push unnecessary treatments. “Similarly to how AI is being used in radiology for breasts or gallbladder, et cetera, it’s being used in dentistry. And honestly, it’s happening almost everywhere,” Stern said on the latest episode of The …

Neanderthals treated a dental cavity by drilling into the tooth

Published by skeptic

Three views of the Neanderthal tooth with evidence of dental treatment Hexian Culture, Tourism and Sports Bureau, Ma’anshan A 59,000-year-old Neanderthal tooth found in a Siberian cave shows signs of deliberate drilling to treat a deep cavity, pushing back the earliest evidence of dentistry by about 45,000 years. The lower second molar – plagued by suspected bacterial decay – features tell-tale marks of experienced stone-tool boring, in three stages, down to the pulp. While the procedure would have been excruciating, it probably led to pain relief in the individual, who went on to chew with the tooth, possibly for years, says Kseniya Kolobova at the Russian Academy of Sciences. “Our discovery challenges prejudices about Neanderthal cognition directly, showing that they were capable of causal reasoning about disease,” she says. “We trust the evidence from our microscopes.” In the Altai mountains of south-western Siberia, Russia – where Neanderthals migrated from Europe about 70,000 years ago – researchers discovered a lower molar with a large, irregularly shaped concavity comprising three partially overlapping dips into the entire pulp …

A medieval Scot rocked a 20-carat gold dental bridge

Published by Jenni Sidey

Get the Popular Science daily newsletter💡 Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. Today, extensive tooth repair or replacement often requires the installation of a dental bridge made from durable resin and metal. That said, the procedure is nothing new. Archaeological examples of dental bridges date back thousands of years across cultures around the world. Recently, researchers discovered the oldest variant ever found in Scotland, but it’s anything but inconspicuous. According to a study recently published in the British Dental Journal, the medieval dental bridge excavated in Aberdeen was crafted using 20-carat gold. Simplified bridges made from silver or gold wire called dental ligatures date back to at least 2,500 BCE in ancient Egypt. In some cases, funerary preparers installed them in the recently deceased to make their bodies appear more “complete” for the afterlife. However, it took until the Middle Ages before more complicated dentistry spread throughout Europe. Even then, primary texts suggest tooth maintenance likely wasn’t performed by doctors or surgeons. “During the Middle Ages, teeth were often treated by …

Dental practice software maker fixes bug that exposed patients’ medical records

Published by skeptic

Practice by Numbers, the developer of a patient management software used in thousands of dentist’s offices, has fixed a security flaw that exposed the private health records of patients on a portal that comes bundled with the software, TechCrunch has learned. One patient, Joseph R. Cox, reported the bug to TechCrunch after he encountered the issue while looking at his own dental records on the portal, which was offered by his dentist’s office. This patient portal is part of a dental office management software made by Practice by Numbers, which claims its products are used in over 5,000 dental practices across the United States. Cox said the bug allowed any user of the portal, which houses patients’ medical documents and health records, to access documents belonging to other patients. He said he was able to access other patients’ documents from his account, including their personal information, medical histories, photo identification, and other files. The bug also meant that Cox’s records were just as exposed to other patients. Cox said he attempted to alert the company …

It’s not a dental issue: An oral medicine specialist says what a painful mouth might actually mean if you’re a woman over 50

Published by Daniella Wilson

You might notice a scalding, intense stinging sensation in your mouth – a deeply unpleasant feeling that, understandably, can start to take a toll on your daily life. If this discomfort persists, you may be experiencing what is medically known as Burning Mouth Syndrome (BMS). To help us understand the condition better, we spoke with Dr Dídac Sotorra Figuerola, a leading specialist in Oral Medicine and Pathology, shared his expertise on how to identify and manage this persistent condition. He also specifies who might be more at risk of BMS. “As a general rule, the condition most commonly affects women around the time of the menopause, typically between the ages of 50 and 60,” he reveals. “That being said, it can occur at almost any age, usually from 30 onwards, and can affect men as well. We’re also seeing a growing trend of younger patients being diagnosed.” What exactly is Burning Mouth Syndrome? BMS is a chronic condition characterised by a painful stinging or scalding sensation throughout the mouth. While the disorder isn’t physically dangerous, …

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