Problems:

  1. The process is painful for the patient and no anesthetic is offered. The myth: Beauty or Cosmetic Health is painful; or requires pain.
  2. The Technology is in black and white; as in, old, outdated, and does not provide a full color picture, using 360 degree images of what is really going on inside the body and the mouth.
  3. The images are produced similar to photographic negatives, which should be some indication that there is a problem with photography, or an advance needed to modernize with digital imaging.
  4. There have been warnings of radiation associated with cancer, causing additional equipment requirements and unnecessary or additional concerns for the patient, leading to a greater need for healthcare, showing its industrial commercialized intent to profit using threats/warnings. This can be viewed as near criminal with greater understanding.

The technician states they need to take a picture of the inside of the mouth or body to proceed with any medical or dental procedure (all dental procedures), meaning they need to look inside, just as they use their eyes to look inside for oral inspection or use their hands to feel the area and the patient’s response to human touch to assess painful areas. Humans need their own ability to look and photograph inside and decide for themselves, not to be the sole responsibility of the healthcare practice. This is unfair treatment of humans, in fact, the withholding of technology and information for a price, of which society has declined greatly and improved in some areas, but not enough to enable self awareness, learning, and care, with a specific level that makes professional healthcare intervention or use necessary.

Dental still uses metal objects; as does women’s healthcare for pelvic examinations. These are painful processes, where thin plastics provide more comfort or no entrance necessary at all to conduct procedures, such as checking bodily fluids.

There are other means of collection, where internal human contact or contact with metal objects is not required. It seems there is a standard use for medical tools that requires an update, as well as an update to human health understanding of the necessity and their ability to assess, communicate, and receive the prescriptions necessary to treat symptoms or diagnosis. This requires humans to learn more about their health and rely on their abilities to assess, monitor, and treat, using over the counter options, and seek professional healthcare options when over the counter products do not work. This seems to be the large money maker in healthcare; prescriptions, of which few companies have perfected their products and continue to make large amounts of money, gripping more than half of the population. Statistics will not be provided to prove this point.

Human Awareness:
Pain Relief comes at a price, held hostage by Consumerism and the Healthcare Profession; Self Learning, Care, and Management have been delayed for years because it is commercialized and industrialized. Heavy manufacturing of the decline in human health because of the glamorization of the healthcare field, leading people to believe they are not capable of taking care of themselves without a Doctor, or limiting their abilities, isolating problems for resolution at a licensed practice at a high cost, now a regular function of human society.

When dental problems become visible and too painful to be resolved by over-the-counter products, such as basic pain relievers, patients seek dental treatment, while others visit regularly for cleanings, where very invasive and painful objects are used, similar to sanding down a piece of furniture. More over-the-counter products are becoming popular, such as teeth cleaning, gum tools, dental floss, and more, advertising does not market the products together in a system of adequate dental problem prevention. Products are sold individually, at the patient’s or buyer’s discretion for use. Dental procedures can be costly, and healthcare premiums high, as well as very painful, even traumatizing, with most reporting what seems to be a near-death experience just to feel well. Parents are guided by marketing, advertising, and their personal visits and discussions with Doctors. The internet is available but has not been put through an organized test of adequate system management tools for human use; only there as an informational, still with much human hesitation and reliance on professional opinion; forced at a high cost in many places.

Freedom, human choice and economic status seem to be the determinate.

Something must change. Not only must dental and medical imaging procedures advance, but patients must be provided a self imaging, self assessment ability, along with appropriate or adequate over the counter prevention and relief. Black and white photos are no longer impressive, nor are metal objects of scraping to remove plaque and tarter buildup or to check the internal fluids of women and men.

While scraping procedures are optional for people to do themselves, many rely on the dentist because of what has been presented as a professionally licensed skilled office, even though patients can perform most of the same tasks themselves, if not all. Advances have been made to provide materials to patients to create their own partial teeth and relieve their pain, as well as prevention tools for things such as gingivitis, or periodontal disease, all of which are either preventable or delayable without long term professional dental treatment, as it is currently being sold.

Some angles (like personal hair cutting) are just not possible with just one person; requiring professional services, often because of skill, competence, willingness, and the way it has been sold or presented. Getting your hair done professionally is popular, as is/was plastic surgery. Cosmetic approaches differ from procedures necessary for healthy human functioning, of which, no human is empowered with an organized monitoring system to know what they need, what they need to change, or what they can do to prevent, delay, or at what point professional licensed intervention is necessary.

Are patients being mistreated and overcharged for painful processes that use low quality tools, procedures, and technology? The answer is yes.

Technology Solution: 360 Mouth Photo with Dental Care Application
They can use it from home with a smartphone application that can effectively scan a mouth and provide a view inside their mouth. Show them regular images of growth and change, as well as any areas early on that are not being well taken care of, or are decaying. With an application, people would be able to monitor the progress of their mouths and receive better training on specific techniques for brushing, flossing, monitoring, and managing growth and change, as well as discoloration, and even possibly pain.

Such a technology application should provide associated products available over the counter for specific reasons to improve patient or human understanding of dental care and product use, as well as specific metrics or statistics for product management, by both the buyer and the product developers (all parts of the product, including the technology systems itself). It should also help to monitor all records to be kept in human’s possession, not as the sole responsibility of the dental office. Patients (humans) should have anytime access to their records and be able to conduct their own annual, semi-annual comparison, not by ‘connecting’ the app to a dental office (the record holders) but by truly enabling humans to create and keep their own records.

Students in elementary school should be able to use it and trained to keep it, thus giving back the power to the people to manage their own dental care, records, and learn better with lower cost options.

In more complex or difficult cases, where surgical procedures are required, human’s should have the tools that enable them to know and understand that such procedure is required without a licensed professional examination, in that, they should know when they’ve reached the point of need for extraction, or a procedure they cannot do themselves.

Dental as a ‘service’ can still be an option for those who cannot manage their own, or believe that they are better cared for by a dentist, but they need to understand the level of care is greatly lacking for the price, as is technology, chosen types of tools used (metal), and the painfulness of the processes without availability of pain relief, or even the suggestion of pain relief preparedness before arrival at the dentists office.

Medical Technologies:

Liquids, fluids using metal collection or needle collection for lab analysis, again is painful and often unnecessary, or could use a kinder, gentler means, but greater human understanding must become top priority, for self-awareness, monitoring, and symptom management using what is available, along with professionally written advice with associated products in an application, not on the vast array of options that the Internet (WebMd and others provide). Again, patients need their own record-keeping ability to learn and understand how they manage themselves, using prevention, and awareness, without seeking symptom and diagnosis from a professional. They should understand at what point they need to seek professional care and those should be clearly understood and available in a standard human health system.

When women learn that they go to the doctor to be ‘raped’ by a nurse practitioner or doctor to ‘see if their vagina’ is okay, then humans become more empowered and aware of what is happening to them. With better information systems and monitoring applications, they can self-assess and seek their own treatment for basic health. Anything advanced that they cannot handle from over-the-counter means should be tracked, monitored, and self-managed with their own ability to keep records, not at the mercy and power of the licensed professional. This is what causes a heavy reliance on professional services where clearly tools, procedures, and technology do not even come close to matching the price and level of pain associated by just being examined, questioned, warned, and often mistreated, and misdiagnosed.

Education and the Social Security/Retirement System are dependent upon healthcare, when one does not adequately inform and prepare another.

The use of metal objects, security devices, and more shows very similar processes to criminally based systems, which should give some indication that things must change; or humans must advance in their understanding.

Unfortunately, freedom has allowed human sickness to reside behind closed doors, without bathing, without rules, and without a means to instill human health consciousness and cleanliness. Those are the humans that cause sickness across the nation, as does their freedom to have children, work in public and private office buildings, and live in their own sickness, prowling around online and using their offspring to continue their cycle of neglect, making the healthy sick.

By Sheri L. Wilson

Author, PhD Student; Doctor of Technology, Research