Thanksgiving Eve Interfaith Service. Be there!

If you live in or near Skokie, I would love to see you at the following service:

http://www.tbiskokie.org/pdf/2013%20Thanksgiving%20poster.pdf

If you don't live in, or won't be in the Skokie, IL, area, please search on the internet for a "Thanksgiving Interfaith Service" in the area where you will be spending this wonderful holiday.

Below is a slightly modified notice which I sent out a few days ago to my Dental Family. You may have seen this already.

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Thanksgiving Eve Interfaith Service in Skokie!

This is a big deal in my mind. It is a wonderful gathering of our community. This is an event which is very inspirational and brings good people together of many different backgrounds. Belief in God should unite us not divide us! Join your neighbors, friends and families in a celebration of Thanksgiving which will help you view life from different perspectives.
This is an event which is on my calendar as a priority for each year. You, your friends and family may want to have it as a priority on your calendars after experiencing the magic of our diversity coming together at an event like this. Encourage your acquaintances of different faiths or of no faith to attend this event with you and hopefully each of you will understand one another a little better.

The service usually lasts less than an hour and a reception with light snacks and drinks follows. It features inspirational talks by members of various faiths and excellent music as well. It is a great opportunity to mingle with members and leaders of our communities. The mayor and other government officials are usually in attendance.

There is no cost to attend this event. Non-perishable, food items with unexpired dates on them are accepted as donations for the Niles Township Food Pantry. Cash donations will also be accepted which will go directly to the Skokie Community Giving Program. Many attendees contribute and many don't.

I hope to see you at this event or I hope you can attend an event like this some day.

I wish you and yours the best during the holidays and always!

Sincerely,

Dr. Dave McWhinnie

PS If this is not a convenient location for you, search online for a Thanksgiving Eve Interfaith Service in your area. There are many of them held throughout our great country.

Temple Beth Israel

3601 Dempster, Skokie

Wednesday, 7:30pm 

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Holiday Gift to our Dental Family!

We love our wonderful community and especially our Dental Family! It is truly an honor and privilege to be able to serve so many wonderful members of our community to improve their smiles and health.

This letter is being mailed now to our active Dental Family members. It also applies to you if we can help you with your oral health or smile.

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November, 2013

Dear Members of our Dental Family,

Your health, appearance and comfort are the reasons our practice exists. We are proud to be your oral health specialists. You deserve high quality dental care at reasonable fees. Our goal is to keep you as healthy as possible and have your smile looking great by making what you need as easy for you as possible.

The approaching holiday season is a time for giving and receiving. As our gift to you, any newly scheduled treatment done from now until the end of the year will be done at a 10% discount to you.

These reduced fees will be extended to any friend or relative you refer to our office during the holiday season. This is in addition to the $25 credit you may use toward any future treatment with each new patient you refer to our office. You are very important to us and deserve the highest quality dental care at a good value.

We are your health care advocates. As stated in an earlier note to you, if you have dental insurance or a designated health savings account, we would like to help you maximize both your benefits, your appearance and your health. Each year you may be allowed a fixed dollar amount to use for health care. These benefits do not carry over from year to year, so if any of it is not used by the end of the year, those unused dollars are gone forever.

If you have referred friends or family to us for their care recently, we appreciate this very much. If you haven’t, please do so. We need this support.

Please, call Karen to schedule an appointment at your earliest convenience. Spaces are limited and we want to ensure we are able to accommodate everyone. We look forward to helping you and those you care about always.

We wish you and yours a happy and healthy holiday season.

Sincerely,

Dr. Dave McWhinnie and Team

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We have a wonderful team at our office. It is even better than it was due to the addition of Karen to our team. Karen is a true expert in helping you get the most out of your dental benefits. She is truly a dental benefits expert!

We look forward to seeing you. It truly is a pleasure and an honor to help you with your dental health!

Dr. Dave

Regular dental "Check-ups" save time and money.

The other day we had patients needing 4 crowns who were all seen on the same day. We are also doing a number of other major treatment procedures, recently. It seems too many people are not coming in for preventive treatment and early diagnosis of minor, undetectable [by the patient] problems, which is resulting in the need for more major treatment later. [This is probably related to our poor economy and many people having financial difficulty.]

Small problems in dentistry quite often progress to become major problems if not found in early stages. See your dentist at least once a year and it will save you the need for major treatment and save you money also. This is frustrating for those of us who are focusing on keeping our 'Dental Family' healthy!

Please let us help you by contacting us at: http://smilesofskokie.com/contact/
My professional purpose is to help you with your oral health.

Our office schedule is also updated almost daily on our website at: 
http://smilesofskokie.com/hoursmap/

“Hopeless” tooth condemned by gum disease specialist saved.

We had a very nice lady come back to us after seeing a dental gum specialist and staying away from our office for too long. She didn’t come back to our office for 3 and 1/2 years. Her front tooth had bleeding gum around it and it was quite loose. She was very upset about being told she needed to lose this upper front tooth because it was, “hopeless”. She wanted a second opinion.

The gum specialist in Evanston works with someone who does restorative dentistry also. The fees they were charging were very much higher than our fees.

Becky was motivated and I have a laser for treating gum disease. Her bite was adjusted and the diseased area was treated with an Nd:YAG laser. It worked! The gum health is now within normal limits and the tooth is firm. [For dental professionals: 8mm pockets are now 3+mm. Excellent!]

Becky is very happy! We saved her a lot of trauma and money.

If you would like a second opinion about some proposed dental treatment which you find questionable, please come to us for a no cost, 5 minute, QL [Quick Look] appointment with all the information you can bring [x-rays, treatment plan, ....] and I will be happy to give you a quick assessment. We may very well need to do a more complete exam but I will do my best to enlighten you with some suggestions in regard to your problem with our QL appointment.

If you have a simple question in regard to one problem of any kind we will be happy to see you for a very short appointment and at least give you some idea as to how serious your situation is. This, again, would be a no cost, QL or Quick Look appointment.

We are in practice to help people with their oral health!

We would be happy to help you!

Skokie Health Department survey request.

If you visit or live in Skokie, please completed this survey:

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Hello Dr. Dave,

I am writing to request that you complete the Community Health Survey in the link below, and consider sharing with others who would be willing to assist the Skokie Health Department (Rotary Members?). We are conducting the survey to establish the top health priorities for Skokie for the next 5 years, and are seeking wide community input. A blurb describing the survey is below, along with a link to the electronic version. We will publish the results of the survey later this year.

Thank you for your help, and please call me if you have questions!

Catherine


Please take a moment to answer a short "Community Health Survey" for the Skokie Health Department. The survey is being conducted to assess community health needs, as part of the state re-certification requirements. This process will identify the top health priorities for Skokie for the next five years.

The Health Department is seeking input from persons who live, work, attend school or enjoy events in Skokie. If you prefer, paper copies are available at Village Hall, or by calling ... 847-933-8252 . Here is the link:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/C3LSS5G

Thank you for your assistance!


Catherine A. Counard, MD, MPH
Director of Health
Village of Skokie
5127 Oakton Street
Skokie, Illinois 60077
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Thanks!

Tooth surface abrasion, gum recession and toothpaste.

Toothpaste abrasion and brushing too hard and long have been known to cause gum recession and wear of teeth and exposed roots for years. This is now getting more attention in the media and has been researched more carefully.

Please refer to these links:

http://www.epinions.com/content_3128664196

http://www.saveyoursmile.com/toothpaste/toothpaste-d.html

http://jada.ada.org/content/135/11/1516.2.full

I definitely recommend using the lowest rated abrasivity toothpaste with fluoride and a tartar control formulation.

Please also remember to only brush your natural teeth with a soft or extra soft toothbrush. All of us should only brush 5 to 10 circular strokes along the cheek and lip sides of the teeth and the tongue sides of the teeth. The chewing surfaces can be brushed more vigorously. This will help avoid gum recession and root surface wear. Brushing harder does NOT replace flossing. All of us need to floss every 36 hours also to prevent plaque from hardening into tartar.

Remember you don't need to brush AND floss all of your teeth every day, only the teeth you want to keep!

Thanksgiving, a great holiday!

It is truly one of my favorite holidays. It is nice to get together with friends and family with a focus only on enjoying one another and being reflective on the wonderful world we have to live in.

Hopefully you will be able to spend some time over this holiday weekend appreciating the world we live in, including your significant others of many different degrees of separation. According to some of the latest research for the social media, we are closer to anyone else in the world than 6 degrees of separation.

The world seems huge but it really isn't that large. Hopefully we will be mindful of that in every aspect of our lives and behave accordingly. It is truly best to think globally and act locally. All of us have a direct impact on our part of the world and our part of the world is a significant part of the entire planet.

My best to you and yours during this holiday weekend and always!

Watch for our new, totally redesigned website.

We are in the process of remaking our professional office website. Fortunately we are employing some very competent help in the form of Mike Yublosky of www.diywebjem.com who is quite proficient in setting up this type of technology. He has done some wonderful work for us already.

The new website will be on a WordPress platform. We will have space for all of our Dental Family to post comments directly on the website on its blog pages. This is a very convenient way to participate and share your questions with me and the rest of our dental family at Smiles of Skokie.

I am personally very excited about this. The new design will make it very easy to communicate with everyone and update the information the website contains in a very simple fashion also. It will be a wonderful resource for all of us.

Technology provides all of us with GREAT tools!

We had a patient in the other day who had a tooth fracturing under an old bridge and porcelain fracturing away on the same bridge. The tooth supporting the bridge on the other side was still bonded to the bridge. Without the proper instrumentation it can be virtually impossible to remove the bonded bridge from the still solid tooth it is bonded to. Fortunately I have in my office the ideal instrument for this and it wasn't too much of an issue. We removed the bridge cleanly and without any visible damage to the underlying tooth.

For more information on the wonderful technology we have at Smiles of Skokie, please visit our website at http://www.smilesofskokie.com/ or http://www.caredental.com/equipment.html at your leisure.

I love my iPhone too! It makes staying in touch with my 'Dental Family' much easier.

Hope all of you are having a great day!

Dental Implants are GREAT!

We just had a patient in a few minutes ago who has a front tooth replaced with an implant. [He is also getting one for a missing molar now.] It looks GREAT! We had to have him go to our local lab for some custom shade matching but the results are well worth it. It has been in place for a few years.

We are in the process of restoring 5 more implants now. The materials needed to start on 3 of them are ready to go and just arrived today. We will be placing 2 more on Thursday.

This is not an inexpensive process but it is the best way to do this. The surgeon's cost is in the neighborhood of $2200. The restorative process done with me is about $1600. This results in a total cost of about $3800 if only one tooth is being replaced. This tooth could very well last the rest of your life though. It is well worth it in my opinion and that of many of our patients.

Another patient was inquiring about getting dental implants earlier this afternoon also.