The Tooth Tipping Point
Several years ago I read the book The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell. The tipping point is defined as the level at which the momentum for change becomes unstoppable.
It is a “moment of critical mass” or a threshold. The book describes the many tipping points in our society in which a trend crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads through the public. Sometimes I use the tipping point concept to explain dental disease to my patients. Their teeth may have large worn out fillings, heavy deposits of calculus, and be battered by uneven occlusion. Then a tipping point is reached and the teeth break from the stress.
The challenge is to get people to restore their teeth before the tipping point is reached.
Tags: dentistry, teeth, tooth decay
