Dentistry

Despite daily brushing, George Washington lost all but one of his teeth by the time he became president. He went through at least six sets of dentures over his lifetime, although they weren't, as legend has it, made of wood. Until the 20th century, false teeth were often made from gold, pearl or agate; hippo, walrus or elephant tusks; ox or cattle bones; or teeth pulled from cows, horses, donkeys -- or human corpses.

In the wake of allegations that financial donations influenced admissions decisions to an elite residency program, the UCLA School of Dentistry on Wednesday released details of new rules that are supposed to eliminate even the appearance of impropriety.

A 4,500-year-old grave in the Mexican state of Michoacan has revealed a macabre example of ancient dentistry -- the skull of a young man whose upper teeth had been modified to accept a denture made from the palate and teeth of a wolf or panther. Although cavities were drilled out of teeth as long as 9,000 years ago, this unexpected modification is the oldest known dentistry discovered in the Americas, predating previously discovered filed teeth and jeweled inlays by at least 1,000 years.

Rebecca Lindsay had a toothache. Dentists told the 36-year-old Irvine woman that her dental fillings were slowly poisoning her and that she should attack the problem at the source. Her teeth had to come out. Over the next three months, the dentists, James Shen and his wife, Rily Young of Huntington Beach, extracted nine of Lindsay's teeth -- and much of her jaw. They didn't stop there. They yanked 18 of her mother's teeth after Lindsay referred her to them.

A few weeks ago, it was just a big, beige metal box in a dusty lot off Yanonali Street. But a few months from now, it will be one of the only dental clinics in war-ravaged Afghanistan, a land where lethal dental infections are among the many preventable conditions that have driven the average life span down to 42. The clinic-to-be is the brainchild of Dr.

Government health advisors Thursday rejected a federal report that concluded dental fillings used by millions of patients are safe, saying further study of the mercury-laden amalgam is needed. A joint panel of Food and Drug Administration advisors did not declare the so-called silver fillings unsafe. But in a 13-7 vote Thursday, the advisors said the federal report did not objectively and clearly present the current state of knowledge about the fillings.

Dr. Nathan Friedman, a pioneering periodontist and USC professor of dentistry who developed a groundbreaking curriculum in the 1960s aimed at helping apprehensive patients overcome their fear of dental work, has died. He was 97. Friedman died May 27 in Los Angeles of complications related to old age, said his daughter, Susan Friedman. His focus on improving what he called the dentist's "chair-side manner" grew out of observations he made in his Beverly Hills practice and an increasing fascination with psychology.

Dr. John Miller Hyson Jr., 81, a retired dentist, former director of archives and history at the National Museum of Dentistry and author who wrote widely on the history of dentistry, died Sept. 26 of a stroke at a Baltimore hospice. Hyson was a prodigious contributor to the Journal of the History of Dentistry, the Military Medicine journal and the Bulletin of the History of Dentistry. His articles covered such topics as the history of the toothbrush, women dentists, George Washington's dental health and his wooden dentures, and African American contract dental surgeons in the Spanish American War. At the National Museum of Dentistry at the University of Maryland Dental School, Hyson served in various curatorial posts, including director of archives and history.

I once had a British boyfriend who said, as I emerged from the bathroom in completion of my bedtime ritual, "You cleaned your teeth! I will too!" It's a line that works only with a Hugh Grant-like accent, for an American who neglects his teeth is tantamount to a cat that skips tongue grooming. We are a dental-obsessed culture.