How Heavy Metal Toxicity Transformed Dr. Katie To Into a Leading Name In Her Field

Written in partnership with Digital Nod

Since the dawn of humankind, self-care has been an important aspect of life. For example, in Ancient Greece and Rome, self-care was central to daily life and very embedded in their culture and traditions. Everything revolved around improving overall health, from food to medicine and exercising, and everything was connected to nature. After all, the ancient Roman teachings speak of the phrase “Mens sana in corpore sano,” which translates as “A healthy mind in a healthy body.” The phrase is widely used even today as a way to express the hierarchy of needs, with physical and mental health as the foundation.

According to Dr. Katie To, self-care practices have become more important than ever as the distractions of modern living combined with the fast-paced world and technology are often making people forget to stop for a little bit and take care of their well-being. “Stress, anxiety, irritability, depression, low energy. All of these are symptoms of the modern world,” says Dr. Katie To. “The World Health Organization’s constitution says that ‘Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.’ That’s what people often forget and taking a moment to practice self-care is a way to eliminate all those symptoms from our lives.”

Dr. Katie To is a renowned wellness dentist based in Katy, TX, who runs a revolutionary dental practice called ‘Dr. Katie To Center for Integrative Wellness and Cosmetic Dentistry.’ Her dental practice is based on the principles of holistic dentistry, meaning that Dr. Katie To and her team provide the most natural, non-invasive, and conservative dentistry possible, with the patient’s well-being being the #1 priority.

But Dr. Katie To learned why self-care and well-being are important long before she opened her practice, and she learned it the hard way. She was fresh out of dental school, where she met her now husband. After they got married, they took off on a six-month-long adventure around the world, where they visited over 30 countries. While traveling, she realized that she was at her healthiest. She was able to manage her ideal weight despite eating anything she wanted, and she never got sick.

However, when she got back and started to practice traditional dentistry, the problems started to appear. Dr. Katie To and her husband tried for a long time for a baby but had difficulty getting pregnant. They didn’t know why, as every doctor told them they were healthy. They believed it might be from work-related stress and easily dismissed the problem. As time went on, she began having more symptoms. She was losing sleep, felt irritated, and had skin problems and dandruff, which she had never had before. No dermatologist or prescription was able to help.

Ultimately, Dr. Katie To found out that the cause was indeed work-related when doctors decided to test her for heavy metal toxicity. The results were devastating and showed that her blood was poisoned with mercury and lead—ten times the limit of mercury and five times the limit of lead. It was a huge blow for Dr. Katie To, but, at the same time, it served as a wake-up call that inspired her to create a new and better way to care for her patients. That’s how she designed a brand-new approach—wellness dentistry—that surpasses traditional dentistry in every way.

But what is so special about ‘wellness dentistry?’ As Dr. Katie To explains, wellness dentistry, in contrast to conventional dentistry, targets the underlying causes rather than merely the symptoms. The primary distinction is the health model’s emphasis on doing everything possible to restore the patient to health. As Dr. Katie To notes, patients do not need to continue spending money on pain, tooth decay, broken teeth, or waiting for the problem to be fixed or patched. In addition, the practice utilizes the least reactive materials for dental restorations and dental prosthetics, as opposed to conventional dentistry, which still employs components containing toxic metals.

“Wellness dentistry combines the perfect of both worlds: biological dentistry and cosmetic dentistry,” says Dr. Katie To. “This way, our patients have a better and healthier solution to their oral health problems.”

While her practices offer many ways to improve people’s dental and oral health, Dr. Katie To often advises her patients to take care of themselves in every way possible. “Besides giving our patients that dazzling and magnetic smile they deserve, I always tend to inspire them to take control of their overall well-being as well. My main advice to them and all other people is simple: make time for wellness, or you will be forced to make time for illness.”