We’ve come to it: the last entry in perio series. Before A Tale of Two Hygienists waves goodbye—however briefly—to Michelle’s favorite topic, we have one final interview with more detail than you can wind an entire spool of (not as effective as you think) dental floss around.
Kathryn Gilliam has been practicing dental hygiene for over three decades and is the founder and owner of PerioLinks, which offers specialized coaching programs to oral healthcare professionals (and who previously appeared on episode #221!). She preaches the importance of focusing on the whole patient, not just seeing them as “a set of teeth and gums.”
In this episode, Kathryn explains why it’s not simply enough for patients to swish around some mouthwash, breaks down the keystone pathogen hypothesis, and gives you all the juicy details on every little bacterium.
EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS:
Interview starts: 12:00
– What’s Kathryn’s favorite perio topic to discuss?
– How personal tragedy led Kathryn on the personal and professional journey to where she is now.
– Why it’s actually dangerous that periodontal disease is mostly painless.
– How even bleeding gums fit into a much larger medical picture that patients should be concerned about.
– The luxury afforded to dental hygienists that other healthcare practitioners don’t have.
– Looking at the array of technology used to diagnose and treat periodontal issues.
– Kathryn lays out her comprehensive protocol for dealing with periodontitis in the average patient.
QUOTES:
“I love to use technology in order to better serve our patients.”
“There’s so much clinical, practical information within the research if we just seek it out and seek to understand.”
“It makes such a difference for people to see the bacteria.”
“There are just so many things beyond scaling teeth and talking to patients about flossing. We’re so far beyond that.”
“Everything opens up when you learn how to use this technology.”
“If your mouth is inflamed, your body is inflamed.”
LINKS:
PerioLinks LLC – https://periolinks.com/
PerioLinks webinars and media – https://periolinks.com/media/
PerioLinks on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/PerioLinks
THIS EPISODE COUNTS FOR CE! – but read the disclaimer below as it might not count for your state.
Go here to take the test and get your CE Credit!
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