Salivary Diagnostics

Throwback: Children Get Gum Disease Too

Posted on by Barbara Tritz RDH
Parents always ask me, “Does my child have any cavities?” What I also want parents to wonder and ask; “Does my child have gum disease?” People – parents – don’t know what they don’t know! Too often, we dismiss a “little bleeding” or calculus buildup in children (never mind adults) as poor oral hygiene and admonish them to brush and floss. Yet, without addressing the root causes, this inflammation does not resolve. Evolve your practice: look deeper into bleeding gums in children and ...
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The Missing Link Between Bacterial Testing and Clinical Decision-Making

Posted on by Lindsey Bieligk, MSDH, RDH
Salivary bacterial testing has transformed the way we identify periodontal pathogens and assess disease risk. Instead of relying solely on clinical findings, today's clinicians have access to biologic data that provides a more personalized understanding of each patient's oral microbiome. However, as testing becomes more widely adopted, many dental professionals are encountering an unexpected challenge: interpreting the results is often easier than knowing what to do next. Receiving a labo...
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Why Oral Microbiome Testing Might Be One of the Most Important Health Tests You’ve Never Heard Of

Posted on by Jessica Lederhausen
    What if we could identify risk long before disease develops? For years, dentistry has focused on repairing damage after it occurs. Today, advances in oral microbiome science allow us to understand why disease develops and how to prevent it. Your Mouth Is an Ecosystem  Your mouth is home to a remarkable ecosystem of 700–900 species of bacteria. Most are beneficial and help protect your teeth, gums, and overall health. Good oral health isn't about eliminating bacte...
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The Story Behind Referral Conduit: Why We Are Uniting Dentistry and Medicine 

Posted on by Michelle Hougland
    Every dental professional has experienced that exact moment of frustration. You are looking into a patient's mouth, seeing severe periodontal inflammation, and you know with absolute certainty that it is wrecking their systemic health—whether they are managing diabetes, cardiovascular disease, or cognitive decline.  You want to co-manage their care with their primary care physician. But when you try to reach out, you hit a brick wall. The pathway just isn't there.  ...
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We Are Talking About the Oral-Systemic Connection—But Are We Talking to Each Other?

Posted on by Michelle Hougland
    A New Way of Thinking  For a long time, dentistry and medicine lived on separate islands. Today, we all know the truth: the mouth and the body are completely connected. We read the research on periodontal pathogens and systemic health, and we track the inflammation.  But a massive practical gap remains: How do we actually talk to each other across that dental-medical divide?  That is exactly why we started the Dental Referral Marketing Podcast and built Referral ...
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How Salivary Testing Changed the Way We Look at Whole-Body Health

Posted on by Zach & Savannah Labie
When my husband Zach was diagnosed with Stage 3 colorectal cancer at just 33 years old, our world changed overnight. Like many families facing a serious diagnosis, we found ourselves asking one question over and over: Why? Beyond treating the cancer itself, we wanted to better understand the factors that may have contributed to his overall health. That search led us to nutrition, lifestyle changes, detoxification, and eventually to an area we had never considered before—oral health. ...
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From Cleaning to Cause: How Salivary Testing Changes the Patient Conversation

Posted on by Jonathan Evans
      For many patients, the hygiene appointment still carries a simple expectation: “I’m here to get my teeth cleaned.” As clinicians, we understand that what we see in the chair often tells a much deeper story. Bleeding, inflammation, pocketing, bone loss, and recurring disease activity are not simply “cleaning issues.” They are signs of an infection-driven inflammatory condition that requires diagnosis, strategy, and targeted therapy. The challenge is helping patie...
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Bleeding Gums Aren’t Just a Hygiene Issue – They’re Often a Diagnostic Opportunity

Posted on by Tosha Kozloski, RDH
For a long time, bleeding gums were treated as a home care conversation. Brush better. Floss more consistently. Let’s keep an eye on it… but what are we actually waiting for? That’s how most of us were taught. And honestly, it’s exactly how I practiced early in my career too. In 2008, when I began using salivary diagnostics alongside phase-contrast microscopy, something shifted for me. For the first time, I wasn’t making educated guesses. I could identify which microbes were prese...
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Periodontal Endoscopy: Seeing What Stops Periodontal Disease

Posted on by Lee Sheldon DMD PA
“The critical determinant in periodontal therapy is not the technique (surgical or non-surgical) used for the treatment of the periodontal pocket, but the quality of the debridement of the root surface." — Jan Lindhe, Journal of Clinical Periodontology (1984) That statement is not philosophical; it is clinical reality. Root surfaces must be truly clean for inflammation to resolve and for periodontal stability to occur. Multiple studies have shown that clinicians cannot reliably clean b...
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When Data Changes Minds: How Chlorhexidine Irrigation and Non-Surgical Laser Therapy Transformed a Resistant Microbiome in a Reluctant Patient

Posted on by Robert Benavides DDS
    A patient presented for a new patient exam to our practice after many years of “routine” and “regular” cleanings elsewhere. Although clinical and radiographic findings indicated chronic infection and the need for comprehensive non-surgical therapy including scaling and root planing, irrigation, and bacterial decontamination, the patient declined adjunctive care and requested to receive scaling alone. Local anesthesia was administered, and scaling and root planning w...
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