Health Coach

Why I’m Involved with a Dentist

There are many reasons why a dental office could use the services of a psychologist.

The most obvious connection between dentistry and psychology would be treating dental anxiety and managing pain. However, it may surprise you to learn that there is a strong relationship between oral health and mental health.

Here are just a few scientific findings:

• Mercury amalgam fillings can cause anxiety, depression, and excessive anger
• Flouride exposure can result in abnormal behavior and depression
• Flouride has been linked with an increased occurrence of ADHD
• Poor oral health can decrease your quality of life and worsen your mental health issues
• Wisdom tooth discomfort can lead to mental imbalances
• Poor oral health can contribute to depression and low mood
• Bacteria that create gum disease and tooth decay can trigger the body’s stress response and lead to a rise in stress hormones and inflammation
• Taking care of your oral health can play a role in keeping your brain healthy and warding off cognitive decline
• Tooth loss is a risk factor for cognitive impairment and dementia
• A scientific review of related studies found a strong link between gum disease and mood disorders like stress, distress, anxiety, depression, and loneliness
• People with periodontal disease have a 37% increased risk of developing anxiety, serious mental illness, and depression

These findings demonstrate that dentistry and psychology are intimately linked.

In addition, there are dental patients with special needs such as those with high anxiety, dependency, depression, or prior negative dental experiences. Such patients could benefit from counseling with a health coach. Although a dentist cannot treat these problems, they are in a prime position to refer these patients to someone that can.

When We Met

In September of 1992, Dr. Sambataro & I offered a public seminar on Health Enhancement: Achieving and Maintaining Physical and Mental Well-Being.

Although the tools and techniques we use have evolved since then, we both maintain the same passion for health enhancement and healing.

Over the past three decades, we have both become convinced that the medical and dental healthcare system is broken…and we need your help to fix it.

My Path to Becomming a Psychologist

After several tours in Vietnam, I attended community college in California, studying to be an electrical engineer. I planned to go to UC Berkeley and build a better computer. Three events occurred that would radically change the direction of my life.

First, I witnessed two separate TV broadcasts showing Buddhist monks protesting the Vietnam war. They burned themselves alive without any expression of pain. I was mystified and wanted to learn about this amazing power of the mind.

Second, I started practicing Transcendental Meditation. I had no idea how stressed I was until after my first week of meditation when I felt a deep peace for the first time in my life.

Third, I started a course in psychology, and I was hooked. I decided to focus on my true passion: Learning about the mind and working with people, not machines. I have devoted myself to mastering the most effortless ways of changing human behavior and emotions.

The Most Exciting Changes In the Evolving Mental Health Landscape

We are finally opening the “black box” of the brain and discovering that the “mind” is distributed throughout the body. Your heart has a mind of its own; it is called the heart brain.

Your heart sends more information to the brain than the brain sends to the heart. The heart also sends information to every cell and organ in your body, biochemically through hormones and neurotransmitters, biophysically through pressure waves, and energetically through electromagnetic field interactions.

It turns out that your heart is the command center of awesome intelligence and intuitive knowledge.

The most exciting discovery is that your heart rhythms change with your emotional states. The darker emotions, such as anger, fear, and anxiety, create diminished and irregular heart rate variability (HRV). Positive emotions create higher and more coherent HRV. This variability between heartbeats is a strong indicator of health: The higher your HRV, the healthier you are. You can learn how to increase your HRV through biofeedback and other methods.

Can the Mind Reall Heal the Body?

I have searched for over 50 years for scientific evidence to answer this question. I can share with you that the evidence is overwhelming.

The medical establishment itself has been providing the evidence for the past 67 years; it’s called the placebo response. In an attempt to scientifically prove that a drug or medical procedure works, experiments include a control group that receives a sham procedure or an inert drug.

Multiple decades of research have shown that between one-third to two-thirds of these control groups will show the same or even greater results than the treatment group. Placebos are amazing; they seem to have positive effects on almost every known physical, mental, and emotional symptom. An interesting study also showed that, between 1990 and 2013, placebo responses increased considerably.

What causes these physical, mental, and emotional changes is still a mystery. It was once believed that only suggestible people who did not have a “real” disease responded to a placebo. But this is simply not true. We have no way of identifying who will or will not respond to a placebo, and this is not just the result of errors in self-reporting. Real physical and mental changes are occurring that can be measured and observed in real diseases.

There are at least two issues that are involved in the placebo response. One is the finding that, even when the patient is told they are getting a placebo and there is no active ingredient, they still get better. So, it seems that the nurturing care and concern of a healthcare provider, or healer, is intimately involved in the outcome. We have known this to be true in psychotherapy for quite some time; the relationship between the therapist and the client is the major factor involved in positive therapeutic change.

The other issue has to do with the innate, natural self-repair mechanisms of the mind and body. What’s fascinating is the discovery that these self-repair mechanisms only turn on when the mind and body are relaxed. When you are stressed, these mechanisms are turned off. So, to maximize the mental, physical, or emotional placebo response, you need to find a caring healer who can help you banish the stress response.

Gene Eberts, Ph.D.,
Health Coach
Director, Health Enhancement & Healing
Founder, Victory Center for Health and Healing
Clinical Director, Julian Center for Optimal Health and Healing