24. Airway, Amalgams, and Cavitations: Why Every Parent Needs a Wellness Dentist with Dr. Caroline Jones

Welcome to the Wellness Dentist Podcast. Join biological and cosmetic dentist Dr. Katie To as she explores holistic wellness through trending ideas, real stories, and patient experiences. This podcast will inspire you to make healthy lifestyle choices and take charge of your dental wellness. And now your host, the Wellness Dentist, Dr. Katie To.

Hi, welcome to the Wellness Dentist Podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Katie To, and today we're live from Miami with a very special guest, Dr. Caroline Jones.

Hi, Dr. Katie!

And many of you know Dr. Jones is one of our wellness dentists, and she's had a wonderful wellness journey that I can't wait to share with you. So, Dr. Jones, can you share with us a little bit about your wellness journey?

Yes, I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me on. My wellness journey started a long time ago. I was a victim of amalgam restorations. Unfortunately, all the mercury, no one knew, and if they did, they weren't telling. So, um, lots of effects against my liver, and so I'm still working through that, um, about 4 decades later. Um, so yes, super happy to, um, just get into the wellness experience as a patient and then now providing wellness dentistry for for our patients. So it's really nice. I appreciate you being my Sherpa. So yes, it's great.

And that's a huge amount of trust because I met you through a wonderful network of mommy dentists in business. Yes. And you got to spend time, you know, learning about cosmetic flowable composite with us. But for me, the biggest impression was we spent a week in Vietnam on the Operation Smile mission trip.

That was wonderful.

And that's my opportunity to see your heart, your beautiful soul when you taking care of those children. And we had such a wonderful opportunity to be able to serve. And children play a really important part in your dental, I would say, journey also. You didn't start out as a pediatric dentist, but somehow you were drawn to treating a lot of children. So can you share with us a little bit about the work that you've done in South Dakota?

Yes, so I was fortunate to be able to work with the Lakota children off the Pine Ridge Reservation. It's one of the most economically depressed areas of the nation, and these children just don't have access to care. So I worked with Black Hills Pediatric Dentistry, wonderful group of people, and we were able to really provide basic services to the Lakota kids. I think what's most important there as far as a wellness journey goes is that no one's really sharing what happens to children when they are not given the opportunity to have things that are healthy for them. The access to food is really difficult as well, so lots of convenience items. Refrigeration is not very common. Running water sometimes surprisingly is not present on, uh, in some homes. So that makes it very difficult for kids to be well. Lots of allergens lots of airway issues, tonsils that are touching, lots of things that are a challenge to wellness. So I think for parents out there, if you are seeking wellness for your child, you're not wrong, you're not crazy. It's definitely something that you're correct in seeking. So snoring for kids, that's not normal. So I definitely want you to know, um, seek out answers from pediatricians, from wellness practitioners, functional medicine. It's really that important. The materials that we use dentistry in a biological wellness practice are so critical. Mercury fillings even today are being used on some of the kids in the underserved populations, which is still—

do— yes, amalgam fillings.

Yes, absolutely.

After the FDA have warned that amalgam fillings should not be used in pregnant women and kids.

Correct. And that's been happening all over the globe. Um, you know, mercury amalgam fillings are outlawed in almost all other countries in Europe. Yeah. So It's just not appropriate because it is a neurotoxin. It stays in the brain, it crosses the blood-brain barrier. All of those things are just shocking that it's still allowed to be used on kids. And in a population of parents that does not have access to the information, putting amalgam fillings is really criminal in my opinion.

So that's, uh, so it's like informed consent but not really informed consent because you didn't have all the information to make the decision.

That's right. And, um, Yeah, it's really shocking. So I'm super happy to be able to help parents guide them through a wellness journey for their children. So many additives in the United States are approved by the FDA, um, and really shouldn't be in our bodies. They're petrochemicals and things like that that are just not— the red dyes, things that are causing health issues. Uh, it's kind of stacking. So every single decade that you're living in affects the decades in the final decade of your life.

Yeah, the last 10 years.

Yes, that's right.

But you know, I'm so glad now that you moved to Texas because in Texas we are having a movement to remove those food coloring and additive in children's snacks and food.

Thank goodness.

Which is why not? We protect our future, right? Our children is our future. And I'm so glad you mentioned about snoring in children because my son Bailey, you met him.

Yes.

He's wonderful. He's 10 years old now and he did not snore all the time. Sometime, and we noticed his tonsil was really enlarged. And we have no sugar, no dairy in at home, but we still did not know what caused it until our doctor did testing and turned out corn, regardless if non-GMO or organic, because we would get him snack, you know, popcorn, but it's non-GMO and organic popcorn. But turned out even with that, his tonsil get really large. So what we did is for 30 days, we remove corn out of his diet. It. And guys, his tonsils shrink 50%.

That's amazing.

And so instead of have to go to ENT and get the tonsil removed, we'd be able to shrink that with remove the right allergen, right? And so I'm glad that you bring it up because a lot of parents thinking, okay, I already do no sugar, no dairy, which is very challenging for parents in raising kids. I know it is really hard to raise children in this day and age compared to our parents and our grandparents.

The food is different.

Yeah, there's not a lot of temptations back then, or not access, not— you don't even have that at school. And at the grocery store, there's not a lot of snack, and things are like home cooking. But now your children exposed to so much, right? And so I'm glad that you bring it up because I think a lot of parents doesn't know that, oh, I thought maybe just dairy, gluten, and sugar, but turn out there could be other things.

Yes, the allergens are really high, and I think the inflammation in children is even more elevated with just the environment. I mean, the air quality is of huge importance. So air filtration at home is going to be something that a lot of people don't even think about. But yeah, the allergens on the bedding and—

You spend 8, 10 hours, especially kids, they sleep longer.

Correct.

In the bedroom.

Yes.

Yeah. So we have air filter in the bedroom for each kid.

That's wonderful. And I think for parents out there, there are options that are affordable. You don't have to spend, you know, all of your life savings trying to protect yourself from all of the allergens and pollutants. But it's definitely important to make sure the indoor air quality is also appropriate. One of the other things that I was gonna share is the way that you can prevent decay in the first place. A lot of parents don't know that you can actually period, make periods with your food. And so you're able to eat for 30 minutes, drink for 30 minutes, anything that's not still water, and then take a pause for 2 hours, and that reduces the acid in your mouth. So that your kids don't have a lot of high acid environment for a long time. So a lot of kids are growing and their brains are growing, so they're hungry all the time. I was a parent, my boys are older now, but when they were younger, I felt like I needed 2 refrigerators, one for each of them. And so that was like, you're not there quite yet, but the teenage years are really crazy for the food. So just make sure that they're eating in these little nodes. So 30 minutes of food and drink, anything that's not still water is super important, and that'll help them not get cavities as much. So a really nice reduction in acid.

Yeah, you know what interesting I noticed? You worked at the— I would say special circumstances, like specialized in seeing kids that need a lot of care. Then you come into our practice, which is a wellness practice that focuses into biological dentistry and cosmetic dentistry, non-invasive, and I noticed that you actually treating every patient the same. You look at everything. You're looking at their, how they was born, looking at their posture, talking to the parents, talking about nutrition, airway, you know, mouth breathing versus nasal breathing. It's not necessary that you have to go to a wellness dentist to get that. Every dentist can really get that training and start implementing that in their practice. And I'm talking to pediatric dentists here.

Yes.

You, you, I seen a lot of pediatric dentists reach out to you and ask you about how do you practice wellness dentistry on children. And so what message you have for pediatric dentists or any dentists out there say, oh, you know what, I don't have patient that looking for wellness and biological dentistry in my practice, but in fact, they can practicing it and provide that wellness to their patient.

I think a lot of pediatric dentists are kind of, I won't say brainwashed, but conditioned to have a high-volume practice that focuses on the number of patients that they see per hour. Typically it's big large bays of 7 or 8 chairs, and then you have some operative units. We had 5 at the office in South Dakota just for the volume, and I think it— for if you slow down just a little bit, you can do an airway screening for patients. That's so meaningful. They are now— research is showing that the airway, when kids aren't getting enough oxygen while they sleep, they're actually having behavior issues. So the tendency to not collaborate with the orthodontist for airway development, and also the tendency to collaborate— not to collaborate with the pediatric physicians and functional medicine people. I think that's a big area of opportunity for our colleagues in pediatric dentistry where they can actually reach out and refer the patients to ENT when appropriate and screen for the airway issues. I mean, ADHD medications are life-changing for the patient when maybe they just needed to have some more oxygen while they're sleeping.

Yeah, and you know, I'm a wellness dentist and I have two children, and I want my kid to see Dr. Jones. You know, like, you're not supposed to see your family because as I'm seeing my kid in the chair, I'm a mom, right? Not the wellness dentist. So I can tell you that if you have not looked into wellness dentistry for your children, you need to, because my— both of my kids see a functional pediatrician and the exam was so thorough. This reminds me of the exam that we're doing at the office for our patient, especially for our young Physicians, and they don't wait until the kid's sick. They do blood work every year. So both of my children— yes, my husband thinks it's very brutal to get blood work on children, but now he's on board. At the beginning, he's like, oh, you're gonna stick them? And I said yes, because we cannot look at the child and say, oh, I think you have enough vitamin D, I think you have enough protein, and I think you have enough good fat, omega-3. We gotta have blood tests and As long as you give them a treat after, right? A clean, healthy treat, right? They will forget about it. And in fact, I had a video to show you that Apple didn't even cry.

It was amazing. Yes. Yes. So she's so brave.

So just like how we think about functional pediatrician that doing blood tests annually once a year on a specific panel for, for children to know, oh, this child needs to have supplement now because our food these days doesn't have enough nutrients.

Absolutely.

So I love that we focus on prevention and focusing on really optimizing for the child to grow at the full potential. We know that we need to really think about the child potential. We be kind to the potential because you never know what that be if you cut it or limit it when they were young. That's right. And so I love that we really helping the children, like changing the trajectory of their life because they sleep better. Breathe better and not have cavity early on and not having a ton of restoration on permanent teeth. So the work that you do today is really, really important. But I also know you're amazing comprehensive and cosmetic dentist.

Yes.

And you know what, those children also need a lot of that work too because, um, a lot of children was born with like small lateral.

That's right.

Or don't have enough space. And most orthodontists were trained to just fit everything in, or if it's not, then removing it. What is your thought on removing premolar, you know, taking out wisdom teeth, all of that?

Right. So, um, you know, my training was in the '90s, in the 1900s, I can say that. Yeah. So, um, we were definitely taught to close the spaces. Our orthodontists were, um, 100% make the room, and it was really more for aesthetics and not quite as much for function. Now we realize that the airway is so important that having the width of the palate is really— if you look at many populations without processed foods, you really see the development of the jaws in the normal, what we call the natural expansion. The tongue is such a powerful either constrictor or expander. So my thought on extractions are don't wait too late for that first screening. I would say that for our patients. Yep. Yes, when they start having— first of all, when they're babies As soon as you see that first tooth, and sometimes even before, they have a tongue tie or a cheek tie or lip tie, they definitely need to be seeing a pediatric dentist. Wellness dentist is what we definitely recommend. We have lasers that can help with tongue ties. And then for the airway, I feel like extracting teeth is just not great unless it's absolutely necessary. We have with the wisdom teeth, the third molars, really they're connected to energy meridians.

That's right, and heart, and yes, and large intestine.

That's right. And so obviously, um, just removing them blanketly is not appropriate. Um, we don't— not faulting the people that taught us, but you— when we know better, we do better. Oh, and I think that's just definitely something to take home message.

Yeah, when you know better, you do better. I know in the last 10 or 20 years, the airway community was doing everything to expand and keep all the premolars. So we were saving premolars in the population, and we quite successful because orthodontist on board, pediatric dentist on board, every single one, including ENT and the dental communities are like, yes, keep the premolars. Right. However, people don't talk about keeping the wisdom teeth. I'm so glad you brought it up because it's connected to the energy exchange in the meridian. And then it's also the only teeth responsible for our heart connection.

Right.

And I said, wow, how do we just take that out on everybody? So the challenge for the dental community In the next decade, or hopefully sooner than that, we're gonna have a mission of helping every child in America to have their wisdom teeth coming in. Yes, I know your reasoning. What if they're not taking care of it? Well, educate them, right? I have all my wisdom teeth. I don't have cavities on them. I brush them every day.

I think it's such a, um, it's such a misconception that, oh, you're 17, you should have your wisdom teeth out. I can't tell you the number of people um, just in general that I know who've just, oh, it's time. And that doesn't make any sense when you think about it. Yeah, there's no real, real reason. And because of the covered socket residuum that happens when the wisdom teeth— it's known as cavitations— that is, um, you know, I had all 4 of mine taken out when I was in college. Now mine were painful, so I— yes, and so I actually have, um, a cavitation covered socket residuum, and it's where the bone doesn't heal. And so you can have— it's kind of going to sound a little crazy— dead bone in your lower jaw or upper jaw that needs to be addressed. People think, oh, it's not hurting. Well, just because it isn't hurting doesn't mean it's not important. We do that EAV testing, which is that electroacupressure.

Yeah, yeah.

And it's an amazing way to just test, is the energy flowing through your your body in the right way. Everything downstream makes a difference. So, yeah, I'm excited to know I only had one cavitation instead of all four. But it's definitely something that, because it's connected to our heart, that's important. We got to have our heart to live.

Yeah, and I'm so glad you bring that up because a lot of patients come to us and say, I have a 3D CBCT done, and I was told by a dentist— should be a radiologist, by the way— but a lot of dentists look at that and say, oh yeah, you have four cavitation. And then they brought that report to us and we're like, no, we're going to send it to our radiologist who trained to look for this or to screen for this. When I say screening, because there's a difference between diagnosis and screening. Our radiologist would look at the scan and say, you know, there's something not healing properly here and we need to explore. And that's when we do another test to minimize the extra surgery if the patient don't need. And that's when the EAV meridian assessment came in. And like you, when we look at the CBCT, We thought you have more than one, right? We thought you have more than one, and turn out you had one. So, and you know, I'm gonna challenge Dr. Jones here in the public on live here, but I know I was just gonna say it's not a challenge, it's just a request that when you get your cavitation surgery, we call the official name though, I want you to listen to this closely, the official name of that procedure is open bone biopsy. Why biopsy? Because we don't know what's in it. We don't know if you have parasite or bacteria and what's bacteria. So biopsy mean we send it out to testing, two tests, not one. One is pathology test and the other is histology test.

Right.

Both of them are medical pathologies. One is in West Virginia and one is in Colorado and they independent and they also send the report back to us. To the patients, and we send that to your medical doctor. So it's not something that, oh, I never heard of, it must be not true. Well, we've done thousands and thousands of these surgeries, and every day— I remember your reaction when you first saw it for the first time.

It's unbelievable. There's just, um, it's like oil and water. I was so surprised. Now, I've been practicing 31 years. I've been in dentistry since 1983, and that is, you know, as a dental assistant, I'll go ahead and say that, not as a dentist. Um, but I was licensed in '95, and, um, I've never seen anything as shocking as what is coming out of the cavitations, uh, the— that covered socket residuum. The types of cells that are coming out of there that you can see in the blood flow is just, um, it's like a trash can. Yeah, of stuff.

It's like the body releasing all this toxin that had been, been stored for so many years in the upstream.

That's right.

That people have no symptom whatsoever. And so I go back to my request. We want to document your journey.

Oh yes, absolutely.

And really share it publicly so people can follow your journey.

That would be great.

Not only what is about open bone biopsy, and you know, people know it's cavitation surgery, but what also the impact on your health. Because a lot of people thinking it's just a part of getting old and you're like, I have all this symptom, I have all this issue, but no, it's a part of that whole big picture. So I can't wait for people to follow you.

You're more than welcome to follow my health journey.

So why don't you drop your, um, social handle here so people can follow? And of course I will put everything in a show note for you, so don't worry if you listen in the car, if you are on a treadmill, that's okay. But what is your social handle that people can follow your journey?

So on Instagram is where this journey will be. It's going to be at Dr. Caroline Jones, C-A-R-O-L-I-N-E. Yes, yes.

And Dr. Jones also doing a lot of content for our Katie Toes Center, so make sure you follows.

Yeah, thank you for the follow.

Yes. And so I know, um, we want to keep you here. So much information. I love this.

Thank you for having me.

And you now the master of this surgery, by the way.

Yes, it's amazing.

Yes, because you do— we've been doing so much. We're doing this in the office every week. And to me, it's one of my favorite surgeries because I see the impact starting in the chair.

It's amazing. I remember our patient who was, um, in for— he was a cancer survivor, or is a cancer survivor. And when I met him back in October when I was visiting the office, uh, and then saw him as a— as my patient now, um, it's incredible the difference in his complexion after his, um, what I— what you call the put out fires, um, yeah, to address those infections in the bone. Yeah, just looks so much different.

We call it chronic silent infection. Yes, because you don't feel it.

—That's right.

—And nobody see it unless they know what to look for. —That's right.

So thank you so much for the screening. Yeah, I was pretty surprised. I was like, "Oh, I have a healthy dentition." And wow, it was really interesting to know and learn. And I'm super happy to share that journey with everybody.

And as a provider, I can guarantee you all of us are going through this journey on our own too, at our own pace, at our own history. But we're going through it as patients. And because of that, we know exactly what our patients are going through. And we're all going through this because we want to be healthier, right?

Yeah, yeah. That's going to affect the terminal decade of our lives.

That's right. We do today.

Yes, yes, yes. I'm going for 120.

So yeah, you know, they talk about 180 at the biohacking conference.

I don't, I don't doubt that at all. So yes, okay, I'll live for longer.

Yes. And one last question before the show's done is every guest on the show I'm asking about what is the 3 wellness practices that you do daily that's considered non-negotiable for you.

So definitely the non-negotiable for me is to get outside outside in the morning and get your vitamin D. 10 minutes after you wake up, if at all possible, get yourself outside. No sunglasses. Soak up the sun. The rising sun gives you melatonin production, believe it or not, and that helps you sleep at night. And so middle of the day, getting outside. So the vitamin D is super, super important. I definitely watch what I eat, and in that way, my blood sugar— this is the most important thing that I've learned. That's huge in my health journey. Oh my gosh, that's sort of my focused now. So I wear a continuous glucose monitor that's paired with my phone. So what I learned was the pattern of eating makes a huge difference in— it's, it is what you eat, but it's also what you eat first. So a healthy fat, protein, and then eat your other things that might be on the plate that might not be so friendly. And then water and hydration, that is key to keeping every single part of your body working the right way.

Yeah, I love this section, and I know a lot of our listeners love this section because not once that we have a guest, um, saying the same 3 things. And it's always a good reminder for people because all the things that you was just talking about is things that we know already. It's just we have not done it consistently, and that's the reason why we didn't have the health that we was looking for, because we keep chasing or we keep forgetting that, hey, we need to drink water. We need to get our steps in, we need to get our sleep down, and of course, the glucose monitoring. So I love that. Sugar is death. Yes. I'm a big fan of continuous glucose monitoring. I've been doing it for over 3 years. And just like you said, it's not just what you eat, your stress level, your movement, your sleep, all affecting your glucose level throughout the day. So it's a great reminder. Thank you, Dr. J. Thank you so much for having me. Yes, we need to do this again. Yes, absolutely. We work together every day. And you know what, it's always nice to sit down and talk to each other and really share the journey with our patients and our listeners. So thank you again for being here today. I'm so happy. Make sure you follow Dr. Jones for her wellness journey, especially her cavitation open bone biopsy journey. And of course, she's giving so many educational tips on her social channels. So follow and see you at the next episode.

Bye everyone. Thank you for listening today.

Wellness starts in your mouth and includes your entire life. When you understand that, the whole game changes. Come learn more at thewildnesstdentist.com. We see you in the next episode, and remember, there's always a reason to smile.