Teeth whitening in beauty establishments is prohibited - NDA president,
According to Dr. Tope Adeyemi, the departing National President of the Nigerian Dental Association, it is unlawful to provide dental services, particularly teeth whitening, scaling, and polishing, at beauty parlours.
Additionally, he cautioned that people who have teeth whitening treatments at salons and beauty parlours run the danger of developing sensitive teeth and potentially dying.
When the dentin is exposed, a tooth becomes sensitive, making hot, cold, sweet, or acidic foods and beverages uncomfortable to swallow.
The president of the NDA also said that the majority of beauticians who performed the services were not licensed to provide such services and were not dentists.
Adeyemi also criticised the lack of collaboration with law enforcement in order to apprehend and shut down the illegal dental parlours and saloons, claiming that reported cases frequently went unanswered.
In order to ensure the closure of illegal clinics for the public's safety and health, the outgoing president urged law enforcement agencies to work with the association.
Beauty salons and parlours have proliferated, providing dental procedures including teeth whitening, scaling, and polishing in addition to facials, hairstyles, manicures, and spa treatments.
There were no distinct rooms set up for the dental services, according to additional inspections of a few physical stores.
Additionally, attendants performed the treatment without donning the necessary protective gear, including face masks or gloves.
But teeth whitening, according to the National Health Service, United Kingdom, is a form of dentistry that should “only be carried out by a dentist or another regulated dental professional, such as a dental hygienist or dental therapist, on the prescription of a dentist.”
WebMD notes that teeth whitening is a procedure to lighten the colour of the teeth and remove stains.
The methods, according to another health blog, Healthline, include sanding down stains, using bleach or ultraviolet light therapy.
Moreover, the active ingredient in the whitening product is hydrogen peroxide or carbamide peroxide.
The Public Health section of the European Commission notes that 62 per cent of persons who used teeth whitening products containing hydrogen peroxide, complained of hypersensitivity (sensitive tooth), while 45.9 per cent reported soft-tissue irritation.
According to the World Health Organisation, oral diseases affect about 3.5 billion people globally with far-reaching consequences.
It adds that while oral diseases are preventable, they pose a major health burden in many countries and affect people throughout their lifetime, causing pain, discomfort, disfigurement and even death.
Continuing, the outgoing NDA president said, “Persons doing those procedures at beauty salons, more often than not are not dentists. The general public is usually deceived into accessing those services in those places but ideally, they shouldn’t and it’s not permissible.
“To carry out dental procedures in a beauty shop is very illegal. Treatment or handling of human tissue, which the mouth is part of, is to be done by trained professionals, and dentists. So if these beauticians are doing it, it is illegal and is not permitted.”
He further noted that several efforts by the association to curb the illegal practice yielded no result.
“So in the past and recently, we’ve had the police arrest a number of them but you know how Nigeria is. After their arrest, they get money and bail themselves out. Like a vicious cycle, they are arrested, bail themselves out and continue through their services. That’s the situation we are in,” Adeyemi said.
The dentist further noted that some persons exposed to the bleaching gels used in the teeth whitening procedures were at risk of tooth sensitivity.
He added, “Some come down with burning of the gum because all the necessary precautions that need to be taken, those people who are non-licensed don’t know it, and so it causes more complications to those individuals.”
The president of the NDA denounced the operations of unauthorised beauty salons and dental clinics that do not employ a licensed dentist.
He claimed that dental and oral health clinics and salons that wished to operate without a dentist should not be granted a licence or registration.
However, Adeyemi stated, "What we discovered is that in certain states, people go ahead and register without going through the formalities. In other states, the facility is registered using a doctor's licence that is somehow located. Therefore, if you look up the clinic's owner in the state's records, you'll see a doctor, but in reality, it's only the doctor's licence that those quacks who still practise medicine received, legally or illegally who continue to wreak havoc on the people.”.
He advised Nigerians against seeking dental procedures in a beautician shop, stating that beauticians were not trained to handle emergencies that could arise.
“If there is an emergency that requires serious management, that beautician who is not trained to handle emergencies will not be able to handle it. An emergency is an emergency, it can lead to death.
“Imagine that the procedure is being done on someone who has asthma, for example, and the person goes into an asthmatic attack. What does a beautician know about the management of asthma? Before the person will even understand what is happening to the person he is attending to, the person probably will die.
"There are other additional issues or complicating variables that the beautician is not qualified to recognise or address if they arise. The immediate money they want to get from the person is all that matters to them.
Therefore, as it is a form of treatment, they are legally prohibited from providing it. They are not allowed to treat anyone if they lack the necessary dental knowledge, according to Adeyemi. Scaling, polishing, and teeth whitening are examples of treatments.
For the benefit of the public, he urged law enforcement officials to cooperate with the NDA in order to shut down unlawful clinics.
