In medicine, a “Gold standard” customarily refers to the clinical model, method, procedure, intervention, or measurement of known validity and reliability, which is generally taken to be the best available, against which new tests or results and protocols are compared. It is evaluated through the conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients.
Objectively weighing information to determine its value as evidence is crucial to determining what may qualify as a Gold standard. This objective evaluation, however, can be disregarded through a logical fallacy known as argumentum ad antiquitatem: an appeal to tradition. This is a claim in which a concept is deemed correct on the basis of its correlation with past tradition, often taking the form of “this is right because we’ve always done it this way.” An appeal to tradition essentially makes two assumptions:
- The old way of thinking was proven correct when introduced; since the old way of thinking was prevalent, it was necessarily correct.
In reality, this may be false—the tradition might be entirely based on incorrect grounds.
- The past justifications for the tradition are still valid.
In reality, the circumstances may have changed; this assumption may also therefore have become untrue.
Unfortunately, this logical fallacy has found its way into how we define the “Gold standard” in bone grafting and implant dentistry. Many factors go into choosing the best bone graft material for your patients. Most clinicians are trained that autografts are the gold standard and allografts are an acceptable alternative. That may have been true 10 years ago, but science has evolved, and studies now prove that beta tricalcium phosphate granules are equal to or superior than the performance of both allografts and autografts.
Below is a list of studies that support these findings:
Below is a list of studies that support these findings:
