The AP examined a claim made in a video posted on Facebook that “the No. 1 cause of heart attacks is a tooth treated for a root canal.” The AP said, “There’s no credible scientific evidence that having a root canal can cause a heart attack, according to endodontists,” and “cardiologists confirm this as well.” The AP featured information from Association of Endodontists (AAE) President Stefan I. Zweig, DDS, who said, “There is no credible evidence that having root canal therapy can cause a heart attack.” Root canal treatments “are safe while allowing the patient to keep their tooth, Zweig said.” The article reported that the “video references a 2019 documentary called ‘Root Cause,’ which argues root canals are linked to several medical issues.” The AAE, American Dental Association, and the American Association for Dental Research “publicly criticized” the documentary and “wrote to Netflix that its central claim had been ‘disproven by decades’ worth of peer-reviewed, scientific evidence.”
