Aloe vera

Whole Leaf Aloe Vera In Dentistry

By James Harrison, D.D.S., F.A.G.D.

Post-treatment dental discomfort and pain are among the most unpleasant forms of misery we humans inflict upon ourselves. In providing relief from this, the blessed Aloe Vera plant displays yet another example of Heavenly mercy.

This story started for me on a weekend in July of 1991. Dr. Bruce Hedendal gave me a bottle of “Whole leaf” Aloe vera concentrate. He said that a report by Lee Ritter, N.D., showed that all Aloes were not equal, in fact some had no active ingredients whatsoever.

I had been using an Aloe product, which cost approximately $23.00 a gallon, for the past six months, but had not noticed any particular benefit. I was using it simply because I had heard of Aloe’s legendary benefits. The bottle said, “100% pure, tastes like spring water,” and according to the Ritter report, it was water. I was skeptical that this whole leaf Aloe product would produce any more noticeable benefits than before, but that is what this article is about.

Within two days of using the products, I noticed a tremendous increase in energy. I had been riding a hypoglycemic roller coaster for years, fueling up on caffeine and sugar to climb out of the slumps, only to find myself in another some hours later. That first week, I felt good, but I really was not paying attention to it. It was approximately two weeks into using the new Whole Leaf Aloe Vera that I noticed that I was thinner. Because my weight had been creeping up, I had been avoiding the scale; but that morning I had to check it out. To my surprise, I was a full five pounds lighter. It was only then that I realized why I had lost the weight. I was no longer feeding with sugar and caffeine the roller coaster slumps, but I was cruising nicely along near the top.

I had been using the Aloe Vera on my forehead, which had many patches of recurrent actinic keratosis, a pre-cancerous condition, which had in the past been removed with cryotherapy (liquid nitrogen). It took a month of using the concentrate, but these patches have gone into remission.

I have been an allergy sufferer my entire life, but the situation had been getting progressively worse over the last five years. When I first started using the new Whole Leaf Aloe Vera, the allergy symptoms got much worse, but then they started to clear. I have had a few bad days over the past five months, but generally I am greatly improved.

I have also experienced another benefit worth mentioning. I have suffered with a painful shoulder for two years. The pain is gone. During this time, I mentioned these benefits to others, who also started using these products, and they reported back (in most cases) equally enthusiastic stories.

The next two incidents encouraged me to introduce the products into my practice of dentistry. The first was when a four year old boy fell onto some sharp oyster shells and cut his foot open. I reached him first and covered his wound with 5X Aloe gel. He stopped crying within seconds. It was a deep cut. We cleaned and bandaged it with an Aloe Vera dressing and he was out playing in minutes.

The second incident was in my dental practice. The patient needed his wisdom tooth extracted, and while the site was getting numb we talked about Aloe Vera. He said his wife’s grandmother had married a Native American back in the thirties and had used Aloe Vera ever since. He reported that she is now ninety-seven years old, looks like she is fifty, and acts like she is forty. He suggested that we try Aloe Vera on his wound.

I irrigated the socket with the Whole Leaf Aloe Vera concentrate, and after the sutures were in place, I filled the socket with the 5X Aloe gel. That evening I called to see how the patient was doing. His comments were that “if his tongue didn’t feel the space he would not be aware that anything had happened.” He continued to apply Whole Leaf Aloe Vera for that week and when it came time to remove the sutures, the area appeared pink and healed over. I was quite impressed.

We have since used the Aloe Vera for all surgeries with uniformly gratifying results. One person among many, Mr. Harold Gans, wrote, “I suppose it is unusual for a patient to tell a dentist that he feels he had not even been treated by him. I honestly feel as if I had not been in your chair. I never felt any pain at any time, nor any discomfort after leaving your office…”

What makes that letter so rewarding is that we worked on Mr. Gans for two plus hours, removing numerous teeth, performing bone recontouring, and inserting an upper immediate denture. The check-up the next day showed some mild hematomas, but little swelling. The tissue was a healthy pink. I have not had to prescribe pain medication, except for one very drug-oriented patient, in four months.

I hope these anecdotal stories have piqued your interest to read further, because I have some ideas about what may be happening.