PRESS RELEASE: FOR GOOD HEALTH, INTEGRATED CARE AND MAKING CHRONIC DISEASES HISTORY

For release: May 22, 2014                

         

Contact: Laura Henze Russell, Principal, Hidden River Health Challenge, 339-364-0701 laurarussell2@comcast.net

Elizabeth Brody, Chief of Staff, Sen James Timilty, 617-722-1222, elizabeth.brody@masenate.gov

                                 

Sen. Timilty Working for EHS 692: For Good Health, Analyze Dental and Health Records

Sen. James Timilty (D-Walpole) filed Senate Budget Amendment EHS 692 to ask the MA Center for Health Information and Analysis to include dental insurance records in their health insurance database analyses, which are used by the MA Health Policy Commission to look at trends in chronic diseases and health care costs. Biocompatibility problems with dental materials, and dental infections are major drivers of inflammation, the common cause of many chronic diseases.

Rep. Louis Kafka and Sen. Brian A. Joyce each filed a bill related to dental amalgam in 2013. They were sent to study by the Public Health Committee, but its co-chairs welcomed a related budget amendment. Three other New England states and CA provide some consumer information, and the FDA says state consumer labeling does not violate preemption. The label could include a bar code and a QR code so people can look up more product information on their cell phones. The bills will be refiled next year.

Many legislators thought dentists stopped using amalgam years ago, and are surprised it is still in use. Everyone has an interest in keeping people healthy. Dental plans should be cost neutral and subject to patient protection laws and medical necessity. MassHealth should cover alternatives to amalgam, as Pennsylvania has for years. Paying a little more upfront for biocompatible filling materials can forestall years of higher health care costs for genetically susceptible children and adults. There are a half dozen common gene types that do not clear mercury well, raising the risk of immune and neurological damage. There are numerous studies on higher rates of chronic diseases with amalgam, and occupational risks.

Hidden River Health Challenge is also releasing a new Issue Brief today to make the case for action, subtitled, How We Can Get Better & Lower Health Care Costs by Blending Old & New Knowledge, Ending Conflicts & Rebooting the Health Sector. “It is time to catch up with the rest of the world, put patients instead of industry protectionism first, and end ‘conflict regulation’ and ‘conflict dentistry’ in the United States, says Laura Henze Russell, founder of Hidden River Health Challenge. 

Russell recovered from two decades of fibromyalgia and a year of escalating medical misery which turned out to be due to a genetic glitch in clearing mercury, which off-gases from dental amalgam. She delved into the subject in order to recover her health, and help protect others from her fate. “It is astounding to me that we get no labels, and have no right of written informed consent, for installation of a dangerous neurotoxin that is considered a medical device by the FDA,” says Russell.

Unlike the AMA which holds no patents so has no commercial and trade interests, the ADA was assigned 83 patents in the 38 years - 1976 to the present - in which the US patent office records are fully digitized, including two related to dental amalgam that expired in the mid-1990s. Patents granted to all sources on dental amalgam since 2002 are all related to mitigating its harm to the environment.

Russell sent in-depth letters with information on new peer reviewed journal articles on clinical trials showing harm from dental amalgam to boys with certain gene types to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, EOHHS, Division of Insurance, Attorney General, and the Sharon Board of Health. The Issue Brief is being shared with  the MA Legislature, Health Policy Commission, and stakeholders. The findings of amalgam safety from the Children’s Amalgam Trials have been retracted. The American Public Health Association declined in 2013 to ratify its interim policy that amalgam is safe and effective. Nigeria is the latest nation to end the use of dental mercury, announced May 21, 2014.

The International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology (IAOMT) filed a lawsuit against the FDA March 5^th for failing to respond to a petition to reconsider the flawed 2009 Class II dental amalgam ruling based on numerous errors in the FDA’s risk assessment after 54 months. The Administrative Procedures Act requires a response within one year.  IAOMT is one of three dental associations opposed to the continued use of dental amalgam. It supports science and trains dentists on safe removal techniques when indicated and special equipment needed beyond a dental dam to minimize patient and staff exposure to mercury vapor.

Mercury vapor from dental amalgam, mercury from fatty fish such as tuna and swordfish, from skin lightening creams, and from old medications such as mercurochrome and merthiolate are different forms of a potent neurotoxin and human exposure from all sources should be minimized.

It took Congress 14 years to pass President John F. Kennedy’s bill to add medical devices to the FDA. Unfortunately, Congress never instructed the FDA to require medical devices contain the kinds of patient labels, composition information, health risks, side effects, and a number to call to report adverse events that patients get for every prescription drug, and for chemicals. We get labels on our Cheerios, and labels and health warnings on toothpaste not to swallow it, but nothing on medical devices permanently installed in our teeth. It took the FDA 33 years to classify dental amalgam, and the risk classification is flawed, outdated, and out of step with much of Europe and Canada, which have warnings and consent. Four Scandinavian countries and Japan have banned its use.

There is a growing movement for funding, running and analyzing clinical trials data by gender, led by Dr. Paula Johnson of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Senator Elizabeth Warren, and other speakers at the Women’s Health Summit in Boston in March. FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, who sat on Henry Schein’s board for six years, disagreed, saying it would be too expensive to reanalyze old studies, and we need to move forward. Biotech and medical researchers confirm the need to add gene type and gender.

Russell is a social innovation entrepreneur, economist and ethicist concerned with health and family wellbeing, an injured patient, a mother, wife and daughter with a family tree with its share of chronic diseases. After two decades of fibromyalgia, and a year of medical hell, Laura regained her health and ability to work. She faces large dental costs and lost her appeals to a “great” dental plan due to the FDA ruling that amalgam is still Class II, standard of care for everyone. A former ocean lifeguard, she renewed American Red Cross Water Safety Instructor, Lifeguard, and Lifeguard Trainer certifications.

Russell founded Hidden River Health Challenge: A Social Innovation Enterprise to help people learn about the impact of genes and toxins, importance of our own health information, share and take action. Hidden River is reaching out to people, stakeholders, and candidates running for office to build support for good health, integrated whole body care, and helping make chronic diseases history.

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Why Dental Tourism is Booming - Journalist Resource

There are several major reasons for the growth of dental tourism within and outside the U.S.

1) We do not have integrated health and dental insurance in the U.S.  Dental insurance is strictly a business contract that has no provisions for medical necessity or patient protection.  When patients need to do thing outside the scope of the contract, even when medically necessary, it is expensive, and there is no coverage.

2) The costs of dental materials in the U.S. are much higher than the cost of those same materials overseas.  Talk with people from other countries, and you may learn they get their dental work done when visiting home, saving thousands of dollars.

3) The U.S. lags much of the advanced and some of the developing world in recognizing the health impacts and risks of dental amalgam, which off-gases mercury, for genetically susceptible children and adults.  The FDA ruled in 2009 it is only Class II with Special Controls, requiring warnings from manufacturers to dentists, but not from dentists to patients. There are no consumer labels, no patient information, and no written informed consent for installation of a medical device that contains a neurotoxin. Five advanced nations ban amalgam use, and many including Canada and much of Europe now require health warnings and informed written consent.

4) This gives dental amalgam protected status as "standard of care" even if you are in a high risk group.  This is why dental insurers can ignore, and deny, appeals based on medical necessity despite doctors letters and proof of harm such as elevated mercury levels and chronic diseases and symptoms consistent with mercury poisoning. 

5) Depending on the number of molars and bicuspids involved, patients are forced to pay five figures and cannot access the premiums they paid for decades for the additional cost of alternative filling materials, so they go overseas. It can cost as much as one or two cars, and often hits at or after the time of retirement, making it an extra unexpected whammy.

6) The ADA fights tooth and nail to defend amalgam use at all costs, and the FDA is happy to oblige.  Former Commissioner Hamburg held stock options from Henry Schein as FDA Commissioner and sat on their board for six years before taking office.  She only recused herself from the flawed 2009 ruling within the last few weeks, and Schein wrote that it was deeply indebted to her work on the FDA ruling.

7) There are three U.S.-based dental associations that train dentists in biologic, biocompatible dentistry, and attract dentists internationally: the International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology, the International Association of Biological Dentistry and Medicine, and the Holistic Dental Association.

8) There is also a considerable amount of dental tourism within the United States.  People drive good distances, even out of state, to find knowledgeable, expertly trained biologic dentists.  There are nearly 760 IAOMT members, about 640 in the US, 50 in Canada, and 70 from other nations. IABDM has about 210 members, and Holistic Dental Association 260. There is some overlap; so there are 1,000 biologic dentists in the U.S. or 20 per state, on average, 50 in Canada and 70 in other nations. In the nations that have banned amalgam there is less need to join such associations; Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden and Japan.

9) Journalists need to take a fresh look.  Resources such as the Shorenstein Center’s Journalist Resource admit that their algorithms are inadequate to give accurate, current guidance on medical topics, but they do not post a disclaimer.  The APHA rescinded its support in 2013 for an interim policy statement that declared dental amalgam a safe and effective restorative material.  I ask other journalists why they do not cover the issue and I am told that there is a long history of controversy.  There is controversy for a reason.  The job of independent media and journalists is to dive deeply into these kinds of issues, not avoid or sidestep them.

10) The IAOMT is the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit filed March 5^th against the FDA and HHS for failure to respond to a petition for reconsideration of its flawed 2009 Class II rule, which detailed numerous errors in the FDA’s risk assessment, and ignored the recommendations of its Scientific Advisory Panel.  The APA requires a response within one year, it has been 54 months.  The FDA’s response has been to archive all of the materials related to its 2010 Hearing on the Petition for Reconsideration and Regional Public Hearings, which had strong testimony on this, so they are hard to locate through a search.  I have the links for interested reporters.

If you want sources for in-depth reporting on this issue, additionally google and contact me.  I am working on a major piece on this and am happy to share as this topic needs the broadest national, regional and local coverage.  I'd also recommend the IAOMT website and searchable library, and the DrBicuspid website, for which it is free to register, the DAMS International Facebook page, and the website of the 2015 Documentary, You Put What In My Mouth?  Learn about the inside debates within in the industry, and listen to injured and recovered patients and dental staff, including biologic dentists themselves, not just what the ADA and FDA want you to hear.  

Where to Find a Biologic Dentist:
International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology, Find a Dentist US 637, Canada 51, International 71. International Association of Biologic Dentistry and Medicine, Find a Dentist  US 212, International 1. Holistic Dental Association, Find a Dentist US 259.