?? did ???????????????? ???? ?????????????? ???????????????? – ?????? ?????? ????’?? ???????????? ???? ????????????

It's Europe's last year with Amalgam Dental Fillings

?????????????????? ?????? ???????????????? ??????????????????, ???????????? ?????? ???????????????????? ???????????? ?????????????? dental ????????????????, ???? ???? ?????????????????? ???????? ?????? ????????.

As of today - It’s rare that you come across people who haven’t gotten their teeth filled with amalgam or know somebody who has. These teeth have a silvery hue to them because it has mercury in it.

Amalgam fillings were the standard of care & still are in many countries worldwide

?????????? ???? ???????? - as a dentist, it was never comfortable to work with mercury and knowingly place amalgam in a patient’s tooth, but all students were informed that it’s “Safe”. It weird as hell though.

In my case, for the hundreds of patients that I treated, working at a busy government hospital in India - most of whom had travelled many miles from rural areas to receive treatment – it was the only option they could afford.

I wonder now, in complete agreement with this long due ban, yet wondering what would those rural patients be offered, had India introduced this ban? The one’s who can’t afford expensive restorative material options – this would surely impact oral health care prevention efforts negatively.

Would such a ban even work in countries like India?

Needless to say, I was not surprised at all when I was at the university of Ljubljana, Slovenia, to see composite fillings as a common offering to patients. So perhaps it’s not that bad in Europe?

Such paradoxes exist in plenty in the medical practice world. And medical/dental students are at the behest of their seniors and professors to teach them the standard of care.

But thanks to continued innovation & efforts to make devices and materials affordable, plus evidence based practices, one has hope that safer alternatives will supersede more risky legacy devices/materials in the long run, to make healthcare safer.

With the caveat that large conglomerates abide to ensuring that Device Risk:Benefit ratio discussions takes precedence over Business Profits.

If not, the law eventually catches up.

Which leads to 2 questions for my LinkedIn circle:

Q1:?If you’ve received amalgam fillings or know older friends and family who have, would you agree to ban standard of care devices/materials - that have data showing more living people than dead - with not sufficient data to state mercury poisoning as a cause of death to the ones that passed away.?Would you have a tendency to see such a ruling as an over-reaction or a just decision?

Q2:?More interestingly, if you sat on the #Board?of such a manufacturer, who’s core revenue is generated from Amalgam sales,?would you knowingly ask them to move business to markets where it isn’t banned? Would you judge it as ethical knowing what you now know?

The answers to these 2 questions help open up the discussion to how different humans approach medical/dental devices and materials.

Does a long lasting market presence supersede latest scientific findings or vice versa?

Author Profile:

Dr Namrata Upadhyay is a dental surgeon and an experienced clinical and regulatory consultant in the MedTech space, with expertise in EU regulatory strategy, document creation and submissions. She has honed the hats of being clinical study monitor, safety reporting manager, Chief Medical Officer and VP marketing for a DenTech startup, freelance consultant, medical writer and . As the CEO and founder of NamNRPro, she guides Dental Tech teams to flow better and together, by bringing the World's first Global Dentists' Pool, an Upwork-like platform that supports dental R&D, clinical, marketing and sales team collaborate directly with multi-faced dentists who bring both clinical and corporate experience.