Remember when your biggest decision as an RDH was whether to place PerioChip, Atridox or Arestin? When the Atridox sales representative would bring in lunch and you'd debate site specific antimicrobials--pro and con for an hour? When your office would discuss the best method to "sell" a specific LAA to the patient, what to charge, and how to place it? Ah, the good old days. Well, the original LAA (unless you still remember Actisite) was PerioChip, and I'm pleased to say that Adrian Pharmaceuticals has embarked on a re-launch program to bring it back to the forefront of non-surgical therapy and has debuted a brand new website (www.periochip.com) that will reintroduce PerioChip to a whole new generation of dental professionals, as well as to reestablish it as a viable option for your SRP patients.
The key selling point of PerioChip to your patients, my dental friends, is that PerioChip is still the only LAA that is an antiseptic while both Atridox and Arestin are antibiotics. Atridox and Arestin are both derivatives of Tetracycline (Atridox is Doxycycline and Arestin is Minocycline) and as such, fall under the anti-microbial umbrella. What that means to your patients is that the risk of antimicrobial resistance and side-effects that are not present with PerioChip use may be present with the other two LAA's on the market. The safety of utilizing an antibiotic like Tetracycline over a long time period with a myriad of patients has always been debatable. As we become more aware every day of "super bugs" and follow Aimee Copeland's battle with a "flesh-eating" bacterial infection known as necrotizing fascitis, we need to protect our patients from potential over-colonization of bacteria. If you could choose an LAA like PerioChip that has an excellent safety profile, fights bacteria at a higher level than Chlorhexidine rinse for up to 10 days without compliance issues and is cost-effective, why not put it into your non-surgical perio protocol?
Over the past twelve years I've sold many periodontal products including LAA's, and I've sold PerioChip as well as one of it's competitors but I always come back to PerioChip because I truly believe in chlorhexidine as the Gold Standard of periodontal care and whether rinsing with chorhexidine gluconate or utilizing the subgingival version of CHX with a gelatinous chip, chlorhexidine is bacteriacidal and kills a broad spectrum of bacteria over a 7 to 10 day period. I know that, anecdotally, my offices told me they preferred the PerioChip to ust CHX rinsing because it negated the issue of compliance and of course, there was no staining, but the results were similar or better than chx rinses. PerioChip is an effective adjunct in your perio patient's non-surgical therapy and continues to be another tool on your tray to treat your SRP and maintenance patients, according to my offices.
Stop by the new PerioChip website at www.periochip.com to reacquaint yourself with the only non-antibiotic locally-applied antimicrobial. At 20 chips per pack, they are cost-effective as well as clinically effective.
You can also order PerioChip through Dental Girl at www.dentalgirl.net.
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