What's All The Fuss About Amalgam Fillings?

There has been much publicity regarding the safety of dental amalgam.

Some people claim that the mercury in dental amalgam can cause or affect a wide range of medical conditions.

On the basis of research available by the Australian Dental Association (ADA), policy remains that the use of dental amalgam produces no harmful effects.

In providing advice on this matter to its member dentists, the ADA draws its opinion from credible scientific and medical bodies such as the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) in Australia.

The NHMRC released a working party report in 1999 that looked at this issue. You can view the entire report at www.nhmrc.gov.au

The report concluded that:

“No pivotal study has been published over the past 5-10 years providing unequivocal evidence of any hazard from the levels of mercury presently resulting from dental amalgam restorations”.

In 1989 the World Dental Federation (FDI) performed a meta-analysis of the literature on mercury toxicity and concluded that there is no documented scientific evidence to show adverse effects from mercury in amalgam restorations except in extremely rare cases of mercury hypersensitivity.

In 2003 the WHO came to similar conclusions.