Event Schedule

Dublin:
Tuesday 24th May, 6:30 - 9:30 pm
Citywest Conference Centre, Saggart.

Belfast:
Wednesday 25th May, 6.30 – 9.30pm
Balmoral Hotel, Blacks Road

Dublin:
Saturday 28th May, 9.30 – 12.00 noon
Silken Thomas Suite, Citywest Conference Centre, Saggart

Since the early 80’s I have been fitting splints prior to case finalisation or as a treatment modality in and of itself. At first, treatment was aimed at the classic TMJ cases. Limited opening, reciprocal click, closed lock and pain. Soon the studies of Dr Janet Travell began to influence the way that treatment was forged and an interest in myofascial pain of dental origin was explored. The work of Dr’s Harold Gelb, Richard Pertes, Aelred Fonder and the Pankey Institute influenced my approach. The physicist Casey Guzay opened my eyes to the link between the TMJ and cervical spine. With this the realisation dawned that what happens in the mouth really can have a great affect on the rest of the body, not only at a bacterial level but also on a structural plain. Later, came the ideas of Dr Bob Walker, chiropractor, educator and inventor of the term and regimen “chirodontics”, who saw the link between the two disciplines and drew up guidelines for a combined approach to health.

For me it was really the work of Dr Hans Selye, M.D, Endocrinologist and author of “Stress without distress” who pulled it all together. From his ground breaking research I discovered that so much that I was treating was rooted in his explanation of stress, “the non specific reaction of the body to any demand placed upon it”. Unbalanced, missing, poorly aligned teeth, jaw to jaw discrepancies, poor posture of the mandible as it related to the cervical spine, and the reaction along the kinematic chain, all became stressors that readily derail the body, and put it into fight or flight mode, a stage of resistance or exhaustion.

Patients would attend with head, neck and back pain of dental origin. Tinnitus, vertigo, facial pain, swallowing difficulties, sensitive teeth, phantom tooth pain that would often end up being root treated without subsequent relief, even persisting after extraction of the aforementioned tooth. Perplexing for the dentist and distressing for the patient. Flitting toothache, moving from quadrant to quadrant for no apparent reason, massive coronal removal of tooth substance for a crown prep that still saw the prepared tooth in occlusion with its opposing number, all became part of the daily routine.

From this time in practice more and more events occurred that could be relatively easily treated with the right splint at the correct vertical. This made me think about the number of different reasons that I had for fitting a splint. Really 33 and counting, by now it’s 34 and perhaps tomorrow 35 we’ll see.

What I want to do at this evening seminar is simply explore the possibilities, cover some of the fundamentals and give the practitioner good reasons for issuing splints. For some this will be old hat, a jaunt down memory lane for others it will be new or described in ways that you haven’t heard of yet. The important message to be relayed is just what else we have to offer our patients. It is our concern for our patients that builds a good word of mouth practice. It is our ability to look beyond the obvious, when our patient has been round the block a few times, with no relief, that shows them we care. It is then being able to put our knowledge to the test and succeed, that brings satisfaction for ourselves and relief for the patient.

Come and enjoy an evening of fast talking, a smattering of humour and some good ideas to take back to work and implement in the morning. Bring your staff so that you don’t have to explain it all over again to them and lose momentum.

For those of you who want to take this further, we will be back to run a 2 day workshop, which will include some very interesting work on the link between heart disease and gum disease as we spread Selye’s net a little wider!

Regards

Bill Kellner-Read