Magnification, Photography and Discovery 

 

Magnification

 

His interest in photography started in Japan while he spent two years in the USAF at a military hospital outside of Tokyo.  There he also worked on his dental commanders and was chosen to rotated through four six-month residencies in oral surgery, periodontal surgery, endodontics and children’s dentistry.

 

Traveling and photography became a life long hobby that would cross into dentistry first for records documentation, and then in the communication and education of the patients and finally into both research and teaching.

 

He realized early that the magnification in photography allowed communication and understanding that the naked eye just could not achieve.  This magnification allowed higher and higher standards to be both set and consistently met. 

 

Magnification viewing levels used in our office:

 

Loops in General                             2.5 X to 6 X

 

Our Surgical Microscope                2.5 X to 25 X

 

Our Loops                                       4.5 X

 

Viewfinder of Camera                      6.2 X

            Canon 7D

 

Camera Display                               2.4 X

 

Camera Display                               14 X

            At Maximum Expansion

 

On Computer Screen                       16.5 X

            I-Mac 27-in 5K Screen

 

 

I-Mac 27-in 5K Screen                     168 X

            At Maximum Expansion

 

 

In Lecture room on 30 foot Screen 

Projected for Teaching                       2,520 X

 

            At 30 foot distance seated     168 X

                        

            At 90 foot distance seated      56 X

 

Discovery

 

Early on, he started photographing some and then later almost all procedures which gave him a photographic archive of the disassembly and treatments of over 75-thousand teeth over the last 40 years.

 

He started this because he was opening and treating teeth in an much earlier and more preventive stage that other practioners viewing the same tooth. They would wait for more obvious, larger and easier to see decay or cavities. 

 

He took these serial photographic images on all of these teeth to show to the parents of these children why they needed to be done and as a protection against the criticisms of those in the profession who did not believe this treatment was necessary.  

 

The magnified photographic evidence showed that virtually all of these teeth had penetrating defects with bacterial contamination and decay, they just weren’t visible on conventional x-ray or with the naked eye without opening them up first and looking or evaluating them under high magnification.   

 

This same photographic educational journey lead to the discovery that contamination and decay could be found under almost all restorative dentistry at some level.

   

Leakage, decay and bacterial contamination under existing dental work as well as reservoirs and reseeding mechanisms in untreated teeth were like terrorist in the caves of Afghanistan, impossible to get rid of, with their negative effects on both the teeth and the rest of your body. 

 

Other Observations, Advancements, Evolutions and Revolutions 

 

Dis-assembles of leaking and contaminated dental work

Clean-outs of the bacterial contamination in teeth before final restoration

Re-treatments of contaminated endodontics 

 

Premise: You can’t get a good seal if you try to duct tape to a dirt floor

 

90% fewer new root canals 

50% fewer teeth extracted

90% fewer new crowns 

Dental work that on average lasts multiples of the normal lifespan/service life 

Far fewer catastrophic failures

More predictability/less failure 

Far less discomfort, Better function, Ideal esthetics 

 

Appropriate fees at a higher level for the right procedures, done well; represent far lower cost, time and fewer problems over any type of reasonable time scale.

 

Dr. Vigoren has been treating difficult and complex cases for 46 years based on expectations from a personal perspective. He has achieved the highest levels of esthetics, comfort and function in long-term outcomes.