The patient is doing everything right. So what are we missing?
Saliva Sleuths is the standing investigation. Every other week, prevention-focused clinicians bring the cases that do not add up, read the microbiology together, and leave with something they can use at the next appointment. CE credit included.
Monthly membership. Cancel anytime. CE credit issued through the American Academy of Dental Hygiene.
Sound familiar?
You have seen these patients. You have probably seen one this week.
Four situations come up in this community more than any others. Not because they are rare, but because conventional prevention does not have a good answer for them.
The pathogens are low. The tissue is still inflamed.
The report reads low risk. The mouth disagrees. Something is driving that inflammation, and a pathogen list was never going to show you what.
Textbook home care, ongoing decay.
She brushes, flosses, uses fluoride and keeps every recare appointment. She still comes back with new lesions. The problem is not effort.
The medical history is doing the talking.
Reflux, dry mouth from medications, hormone shifts, a compromised airway, a restrictive diet. The mouth is responding to conditions that start upstream of the mouth.
You have the report. Now what?
Relative abundance, diversity, functional pathways, organisms nobody taught you to look for, and forty minutes before your next patient walks in.
What this actually is
A working investigation, not another content library
Knowing the difference up front saves us both time.
What it is not
- A protocol card that tells you what to do for every patient
- A course you buy once, watch once and never open again
- A product pitch, or a list of things to sell your patients
- Certainty the evidence does not currently support
What it is
- Live case collaboration with clinicians reading the same reports you are
- A way of investigating that transfers to cases nobody has written a protocol for
- CE credit attached to work you were going to do anyway
- Research translated into a clinical decision, every time
The shift
From "which organism do we kill" to "what did this ecosystem lose"
"Which bacteria are the problem, and what kills them?"
"What disrupted this ecosystem, what is it missing, and what will help it recover?"
A cleaner mouth is not automatically a healthier one. Colonization resistance, microbial diversity, salivary function, nitrate reduction and host immune response are all doing work that a broad kill claim quietly undoes. Caries and periodontal disease behave like community problems, not single-organism crimes, and the research has been saying so for years. This community spends its time on the second question.
The Evidence
What $59 a month actually buys
A membership is a calendar as much as it is content. Here is what is on it.
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Every other Monday, 7:00 PM CST
Open Microbe Night, every other week
Live, working case collaboration. Bring a report you are stuck on, a patient who does not add up, or a question you have been carrying around for a month. This is where most of the learning actually happens, because it happens on real cases.
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CE credit, AADH
The monthly webinar, with CE for members
An hour with me or a guest investigator on a topic worth your attention. The webinar itself is open to anyone. Members are the ones who earn CE credit for attending, issued through the American Academy of Dental Hygiene. Credit hours follow the length of each session.
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CE credit for members
CE Case Files
Worked cases, built the way you would work one: the clinical picture, the medical history, the microbial data, the reasoning behind the interpretation, what was recommended, and what changed on retest. Added continually.
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Included, no extra cost
The full CE course library
Member access to the Saliva Sleuths CE courses, self-paced and yours to rewatch. Start wherever your gap is and move at whatever speed your week allows.
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Samples from guest speakers
When a guest brings product samples for the community, they go to members. Trying something in your own mouth is a faster way to form an opinion about it than reading the label.
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The clinicians in the room
Hygienists, dentists, biological and functional practitioners, myofunctional and airway providers, all working the same questions. Ask something at eleven at night and someone has usually looked at it before you.
I joined Saliva Sleuths to learn about oral health, the oral microbiome, and overall wellness, and the experience has exceeded my expectations. The community has given me deep, practical knowledge I use every day: how saliva and oral microbes affect systemic health, the lifestyle and dietary factors that shape microbial balance, prevention and hygiene strategies, and how to interpret emerging research to make informed choices.
Heather combines strong expertise with a genuine curiosity that pushes discussions forward. She communicates complex science with clarity and turns evidence into actionable, realistic guidance. Beyond that, she cultivates a supportive, inclusive atmosphere where questions are welcomed and individual progress is celebrated.
Thanks to Heather's leadership and the quality of the Saliva Sleuths community, I feel more confident and capable in managing my patients' oral and overall health.
Gina Traugutt, RDH, BS, MHPTTSaliva Sleuths member
How it works
Four steps, about two minutes of admin
Join and the rest happens in order. No welcome packet to wade through.
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Join
Your access opens as soon as payment clears, including the full course library and every Case File already posted.
Join, $59/month -
Get oriented
You land in the community with a short start-here path, so you know where the Case Files live and what is happening next on the calendar.
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We meet
You get a calendar link for a one-to-one walkthrough with me. Twenty minutes, so I know what you are working on and you know exactly where to start.
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Bring a case
Come to the next Open Microbe Night with a patient who has been bothering you. Watching one case get worked is worth three hours of lecture.
Steps two, three and four happen back to back. You will not have to come back and hunt for anything.
Since we started salivary testing in our office she has been an invaluable resource, guiding us through the complex and intricate world of the oral microbiome. I feel like a whole new world has opened, and it seems like one of those shifts in dentistry and dental hygiene that makes me wonder how we ever practiced without it.
The wealth of cutting edge knowledge that she offers, along with the vast amount of information on her Saliva Sleuths app, gives us endless opportunities for learning and building our scope of practice. Her patience with us as we try to absorb the information, and her willingness to admit when she does not know the answer, is refreshing. It gives me hope that I can get there.
Shannon McNamee, RDHfor James R. McDonald, DDS
Who should be in the room
Join the investigation
This is for you if
- You are a hygienist, dentist or team member running into cases conventional prevention cannot explain
- You are curious about microbiology but have been intimidated by the complexity of it
- You are using salivary testing, or seriously considering it, and want to interpret results with something to stand on
- You want to practice at the top of your scope with the science to back up what you recommend
- You work alongside airway, functional medicine, nutrition or myofunctional colleagues and want to speak their language
- You are ready to feel intellectually engaged in this profession again
This is probably not for you if
- You want a laminated protocol card for every patient. That is not how ecology works, and it is not what we teach
- You want certainty the evidence does not support. We separate what is established from what is still being investigated, every time
- You are a patient looking for help with your own oral health. This room is built for clinicians. Oral Health Fundamentals Coaching is the right door for you
Your Lead Investigator
Heather Kenney, RDH, HIAOMT
Saliva Sleuths, Clinical Trainer at Bristle Health, IAOMT Educational CommitteeI have been a hygienist since 2005, and for a long stretch of that I was doing exactly what I was taught: scaling, polishing, recommending the same three things to everyone, and quietly wondering why some patients never got better.
Salivary diagnostics changed the question for me. As a clinical trainer for Bristle Health I read shotgun metagenomic reports regularly and help clinicians make sense of what is in them. What I found is that the test result is the easy part. Knowing what to do with it is the part nobody is teaching.
That gap is what Saliva Sleuths was built to close. Everything taught here is tied to publicly available research, and when the evidence is thin or the answer is unknown, I say so. I would rather you leave with a good question than a false certainty.
- RDH since 2005
- HIAOMT accredited
- IAOMT Educational Committee
- Clinical Trainer, Bristle Health
- Co-host, Functional Roots Podcast
Join
One membership. Less than the cost of a single CE course.
Most clinicians spend more than this on one course they watch once. This is the standing room where the cases keep coming.
$59Per month
- Open Microbe Night, every other week
- Monthly live webinar with CE credit through the AADH
- CE Case Files, added continually
- Full access to the Saliva Sleuths CE course library
- Guest speaker samples when they are offered
- A one-to-one walkthrough with Heather when you join
Monthly billing. Cancel anytime.
Before you join
Questions people ask first
What exactly do I get for $59 a month?
Open Microbe Night every other week, a monthly live webinar with CE credit, CE Case Files added continually, full access to the Saliva Sleuths CE course library, guest speaker samples when they are available, and a one-to-one walkthrough with me when you join. Billing is monthly and you can cancel anytime.
Do I need to be doing salivary testing already?
No. Plenty of members join while they are still deciding whether testing belongs in their practice. The interpretation skills, the ecological framework and the host-factor investigation all apply whether or not you have a report in front of you. If you start testing later, you will already know how to read what comes back.
Is CE credit really included?
Yes. Webinars, courses and case file sessions carry CE, whether you attend live or watch the recording, and it is included in your membership at no additional cost. Credit hours follow the length of each session, so a longer webinar earns more, and the hours for each one are stated on that session or course. Credit is issued through the American Academy of Dental Hygiene, which has approved Intuitive Training, LLC as a CE provider. Approval of a provider is not approval of any individual course by a state board, so verify acceptance with your own licensing board.
What if I cannot attend live?
Sessions are recorded and posted, so you can catch up on your own schedule. That said, the live Open Microbe Nights are where the real work happens, because you can put your own case in front of the group. Come live when you can.
Will this tell me exactly what to do for every patient?
No, and that is intentional. A protocol that applies to every patient is the thing that got us here. What you build instead is a way of investigating: how to read the pattern, what to ask next, which interventions fit this patient at this stage, and how to verify whether it worked. That transfers to cases nobody has written a protocol for yet.
Is this only for hygienists?
Hygienists are the heart of this community, but dentists, assistants, treatment coordinators and oral-systemic collaborators are all inside and all welcome. If you are considering bringing your whole team, get in touch and we will talk through what makes sense.
Do I need a strong science background?
No. Everything here starts with a case and works toward the mechanism, not the other way around. If you can follow a patient story, you can follow the science. And if something goes over your head, asking about it is exactly what the community is for.
How do I cancel?
From your own account, anytime. It is a monthly membership with no contract and no cancellation penalty. Cancelling stops the next charge and your access runs to the end of the month you have already paid for. Partial months are not refunded, and months already billed are not refunded, so cancel before the renewal date if you do not want the next one.
The clues are waiting
Disease is leaving evidence. The question is whether we are looking for it.
Join the clinicians who decided that "brush, floss, rinse" was not a complete answer, and went looking for the rest of it.
Monthly billing. Cancel anytime. CE credit through the American Academy of Dental Hygiene.
Some of the science this community is built on
- Dewhirst FE, Chen T, Izard J, et al. The human oral microbiome. J Bacteriol. 2010;192(19):5002–5017.
- Marsh PD. Are dental diseases examples of ecological catastrophes? Microbiology. 2003;149(Pt 2):279–294.
- Takahashi N, Nyvad B. The role of bacteria in the caries process: ecological perspectives. J Dent Res. 2011;90(3):294–303.
- Rosier BT, Marsh PD, Mira A. Resilience of the oral microbiota in health: mechanisms that prevent dysbiosis. J Dent Res. 2018;97(4):371–380.
- Hajishengallis G. Periodontitis: from microbial immune subversion to systemic inflammation. Nat Rev Immunol. 2015;15(1):30–44.
- Kilian M, Chapple ILC, Hannig M, et al. The oral microbiome – an update for oral healthcare professionals. Br Dent J. 2016;221(10):657–666.