In patients at risk because of heart disease, bacteremias induced by invasive dental treatments have been reported as a cause of bacterial endocarditis (BE) - a serious disorder that continues to involve a high mortality. As a result, different scientific societies have supported recommendations for the administration of antibiotics prior to invasive dental treatments, in order to neutralize bacteremia. In this context, the recommendations of the American Heart Association (AHA) are the most widely used in our setting. Advances in our knowledge of the etiopathogenesis of bacterial endocarditis have placed increasingly less importance on invasive dental treatments as a causal factor (the AHA again reduced the number of cases in which antibiotic prophylaxis is recommended, on occasion of its latest guidelines update in 2007) - with increasingly greater importance being placed on factors associated with hygiene and oral health. The present study offers a critical review of the relationship between dental treatment, bacteremia and bacterial endocarditis.