Sedation Dentistry

If you’re anxious about visiting the dentist, talk with your dentist’s office about sedation dentistry before your visit. Sedation dentistry is the practice of using medication to help you relax during your visit. There are several types of sedation, depending upon your anxiety level as well as your preference. You may opt to be minimally sedated, meaning you’ll still be awake and aware, yet relaxed. If the thought of still being aware during the procedure makes you anxious, you may choose to be moderately sedated, in which you’ll still be conscious, but likely not remember the procedure.

If you want to be even further sedated, you could ask your dentist for a deep sedation, in which you’ll be barely conscious, or finally, just have general anesthesia done, in which you’re completely unconscious. Most dentist offices offer sedation dentistry and you’ll need to confirm and ask what types will be available to you on the day of your visit.

Advanced Technology

When was the last time you went to the dentist? If it’s been a little while, remember that modern technology has changed the field of dentistry and the dentist today likely isn’t the dentist of your childhood memories. Most of the tools the dentists use are quiet, small, and minimally invasive. Technology makes many dental procedures less invasive, such as laser treatments and quiet drills. Nearly any treatment offered by your dentist now is able to be completely pain-free! It’s always important to voice your fears to your dentist or dentist office before treatment so that your appointment will be comfortable and painless for you.

Finding the Right Dentist

Remember that while dental appointments and dental work might make you anxious, the longer you put off treatment, the more work you’ll need and the worse your oral health will be. So while it’s challenging to visit a dentist while you have anxiety, you can start by looking for the right dentist to help you. The right dentist will be someone who’s caring and compassionate, especially in regards to your dental anxiety. You might start by asking your friends and family for recommendations: dental anxiety is very common, and some people might be able to recommend a dentist they’ve had positive experiences with even with dental anxiety. There are plenty of dentists out there who see patients with dental anxiety all the time—you just have to find a dentist that you’re confident will fit your needs.

Take the time to visit different dentist offices, talk to the receptionists, ask about sedation dentistry, and even meet the dentist. Don’t delay your dental appointments because of your anxiety—remember that you can find the best dentist for you with a little research, and sedation dentistry and technology can help make your appointment worry-free!

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What Causes It

You’ve heard it before and you’ll hear it again—sugar is terrible for your teeth. The same is true with children, who can experience tooth decay if they frequently drink sugary drinks and then the sugar is left to sit on their teeth for long periods of time. Baby bottle tooth decay can also happen if you let your child go to bed with a bottle filled with a sweet drink. Tooth decay happens as a result of bad bacteria in the mouth that can cause cavities. Even if you’re careful about not letting your child have too many sugary drinks, you could pass bacteria from your mouth to your baby’s mouth if you share utensils, etc. Tooth decay is generally result of a combination of these factors when it comes to baby bottle tooth decay.

How to Prevent It

Tooth decay is preventable for your toddler! To help prevent baby bottle tooth decay, try not to let your saliva end up in your child’s mouth, whether it be from sharing food or cleaning pacifiers. You can also clean your baby’s gums by wiping them with a clean cloth after each meal. When the baby teeth arrive, you can already start brushing them gently!

Other healthy habits include never letting your child drink sugary drinks out of a bottle, which should only be reserved for milk, and don’t let them go to sleep with their bottle. Around the age of one, your child should be able to drink from a cup. Encourage this as well as healthy eating so your child has minimal chances of developing tooth decay among their baby teeth!

How Important Are Checkups?

Dentists are trained to notice the signs of tooth decay long before you would ever see a problem. Pain is often the last sign that things are going wrong and the teeth are damaged. Taking your child in for a checkup when their baby teeth come in can ensure everything is healthy in your baby’s mouth and that tooth decay isn’t already happening. Baby teeth are important because they allow the permanent teeth to come through properly in the jaw—you can think of it as saving space for the adult teeth to come in.

Baby bottle tooth decay is preventable, and your child can have healthy baby teeth to encourage the growth of healthy adult teeth! Remember that sugar isn’t just damaging to your child’s body—it’s also not good for their oral health, especially if their mouths are exposed to sugar for lengthy amounts of time. If you haven’t already, schedule a visit with your dentist for your child if their baby teeth have started to come in. Developing healthy habits early can save your child’s teeth!

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Make dental health your New Years Resolution in 2016. Keeping on top of your dental health is as easy as scheduling checkups, brushing and flossing appropriately, and choosing the right foods. Follow these tips for keeping your smile healthy in 2016!

Schedule Regular Checkups

If you don’t have a regular dentist yet, now’s the time to find one. Even if you aren’t keen on scheduling regular checkups, having a dentist that you trust in the event of a problem or emergency can make all the difference for your dental care. Let’s not forget that regular checkups can help prevent problems before they happen. Your dentist can often spot problem areas that will go ignored until a more major problem is imminent.

It’s a good idea to schedule regular checkups with your dentist every six months. Your dentist may advise that you only need to stop in for yearly checkups if you’re on top of your dental health at home, or he or she may suggest that you need to come in every few months. It all depends on your unique smile and if you have any existing dental health problems. Remember, visiting a dentist twice a year can prevent problems, encourage oral health, and even save your smile!

Brush Properly, Floss More

Brushing your teeth prevents the buildup of plaque, removes bacteria, and keeps your smile looking great. However, brushing doesn’t count for much if you aren’t doing it properly. If you tend to brush your teeth hard, you may actually be wearing away the protective enamel that covers your tooth and its roots. Once this is gone, it can’t be replaced. Proper brushing involves soft, swift strokes that focus on small areas at a time. Talk with your dentist about how to properly brush your teeth.Flossing is also important to keep your smile looking its best. Food is easily trapped in between teeth, and over time, this can even cause infections, gingivitis, and chronic bad breath. Yuck! No matter which flossing tools work best for you, be sure to use them. It’s ideal to floss at least once a day. Ask your dentist how you can make flossing easy!

Optimize Your Diet

You’ve heard that sugar isn’t good for teeth—but it’s not the only corrosive substance out there. Other foods and beverages such as alcohol, soda, juice, coffee, dried fruits, citrus fruits, and starchy snacks like potato chips can damage your teeth. Even dairy can be corrosive to the teeth due to its acidic nature. Do you have to stop eating or drinking all these things? No! The point is that by keeping up with brushing and flossing, you can help keep your mouth healthy. Also by choosing healthy foods to snack on throughout the day such as carrots, apples, and celery. Keep sugars and starches to a minimum!

Taking care of your dental health is easier than you think. By making your dental health your New Years Resolution, you can ensure your smile stays healthy for life. Schedule a checkup with your dentist, keep brushing and flossing, and reach for carrot sticks instead of lollipops. Happy New Year!

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A Brighter Smile – When you get your teeth professionally cleaned by a hygienist, many stains can be removed that you can’t take care of at home. You’ll be happy to smile in pictures after your professional cleaning.

Save Money – Whether you have insurance or not, a cleaning is much less expensive than other forms of dental work. Plus, preventative work is much more likely to be covered by your insurance, so once you hit your deductible, a cleaning will most likely not cost you anything at all (or perhaps just a small copay). Root canals, however, are often not covered, and can be very expensive. Get your teeth cleaned regularly to keep dental bills from accumulating.

Catch Problems Early – When you get your teeth cleaned at the dentist’s office, problems can get noticed before they become serious. For example, problems such as cavities, fractured teeth, and loose fillings may be detected before further damage is done or before a root canal becomes necessary. This saves you not only stress and headache, but money as well!

Protect Your Gums – Even brushing and flossing regularly can only do so much to keep tartar from forming below the gumline. Your dental hygienist will likely use an ultrasonic scaler to remove tartar painlessly, even below the gumline.

Protect Your Heart – Did you know that researchers have linked gum disease with cardiovascular disease? By taking care of your oral health, you are also helping to protect your heart.

Cancer Detection – Orals forms of cancer kill a person every hour in the US. However, most oral forms of cancer are very treatable if caught early. Sometimes, oral cancers can be detected during a cleaning. Getting a cleaning may save your life.

Whether your goal is to keep your smile bright, preserve your teeth for later in life, or save your hard-earned money for something other than emergency dental work, getting your teeth professionally cleaned on a regular basis is where you begin. Why not call your dentist today to make an appointment for your next cleaning?

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Cold sores take the form of a red, sometimes large-looking, blister that is often referred to as a “fever blister”. Indeed, these sores can cause fever, swollen lymph nodes, and even a headache. These sores are always outside of the mouth, usually on the edge of your lip. Cold sores are caused by the Type 1 herpes simplex virus, which is different from the Type 2 herpes virus, which is also referred to as genital herpes, passed along through sexual contact. Type 1 herpes virus is highly contagious and can be passed along simply through touching the cold sore, kissing, sharing drinks or food, and any other contact with it. Once you have this Type 1 herpes virus, it doesn’t go away, but the good news is that your cold sores will come and go and are not destined to stay long.

The cold sore may be oozing a clear fluid and will likely scab over after a time. They can be pretty painful in addition to the other symptoms that they cause, but the good news is they don’t last long and should be totally gone after a two-week period. While there are some over-the-counter treatments available, the truth is that cold sores will just have to go away on their own. If your cold sore is still hanging around after two weeks, it may be time to visit the doctor!

Canker Sores—Inside

Canker sores are always inside your mouth, but their position in your mouth will vary. They could be along your tongue, on your inner upper lip, lower lip, or on the side of your mouth. Wherever they are in your mouth, they are usually pretty painful for their size. They are typically small sores that are gray, yellow, or white with a red, irritated-looking ring around it. These are usually open sores and while not contagious, can be pretty annoying. It’s not known what causes canker sores, but stress, vitamin or mineral deficiencies, food allergies, and even hormones have been thought to play a role in their existence. Like cold sores, a canker sore will need to heal on its own, and the pain usually goes away after a few days and the entire sore should be gone after a week or two. Again, if it sticks around, you’ll likely need to visit your doctor to make sure nothing else is going on. Canker sores can also cause symptoms like that of cold sores—swollen lymph nodes or a fever.

Maintaining your oral health can help you avoid a canker sore, but cold sores may be more apt to appear on their own regardless of your oral health. Minimizing sharing of food and drinks with others and monitor your canker sore or cold sore to ensure it heals on its own.

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Proper Brushing Technique

When you brush your teeth, it should always be in a circular motion. Is it better to just get an electric toothbrush? That is only the case if you get one that spins in a circular motion, and it helps you to remember not to brush straight back and forth. Be sure to brush at 45-degree angle to the gumline. This will help you to remove the maximum amount of bacteria before it has the chance to harden into tartar (which will have to be removed at the dentist’s office during your six-month cleaning). You should brush for about two minutes at a time. This gives you enough time to clean the front, back, and top of each tooth well. You may want to use the stopwatch feature of your phone to make sure that you are spending sufficient time on your teeth.

How to Floss Correctly

Be sure to use about a foot and a half of floss so that you have plenty of room to wrap your fingers (you can also use a floss pick). This gives you plenty of floss to switch to a clean section for each tooth. Don’t just pull the floss back and forth between teeth, but also move it up and down. It is good to get below the gumline since your toothbrush won’t get in there. It’s not about flossing hard. If you floss twice per day, you should be able to glide the floss gently.

So What Should Be First?

Some say brushing should be first because the residue left on your teeth from the fluoride in the toothpaste gets picked up by the floss and improves cleaning between the teeth and below the gumline. Others say that you should floss first to loosen food particles and bacteria that can then be more easily brushed away.

You can decide for yourself which makes more sense. The important thing is to brush and floss every day because it takes about 24 hours for plaque to form. Brushing and flossing at least twice per day prevents this build up and protects your oral health.

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Custom Dental Mouthguards

Custom dental mouthguards are your best protection against injury. This is because they are specifically made to fit your mouth. This includes shape and size in addition to any unique features of your mouth that will need to be taken into account with a mouthguard. A custom dental mouthguard can be constructed at your regular dentist’s office. Although this option is the more expensive option when it comes to mouthguards, the protection that it offers you or your child during sports is unparalleled. No other mouthguard will offer you the same level of protection that your unique mouth needs than a custom dental mouthguard.

ArmourBite Mouthguard

You may also have the option get an ArmourBite mouthguard at your dentist office. These mouthguards, while offered by Under Armour, will be customized at your dentist office. These mouthguards are created by having your dentist take an impression of your teeth, which is then sent to the lab to create your unique ArmourBite guard. You’ll get to choose your color and you can even get your name and number printed on the guard so that if you ever misplace it, it can be returned to you. These mouthguards help protect against teeth grinding during competitions and impacts to your jaw in contact sports. ArmourBite mouthguards come with a one-year warranty and take only ten days to be delivered to your door from the lab.

Benefits of Custom Mouthguards

The benefits of custom-fitted mouthguards include:

– Better quality material molded to fit only your mouth.

– The size will be perfect—no bulky store-bought mouthguards that make speaking and breathing difficult.

– Proper, custom fit effectively separates the upper and lower jaw so that any impact will be properly absorbed by the mouthguard instead of going to the teeth or head.

– Prevents teeth grinding.

– Custom-fitted mouthguards effectively reduce the risk of injury from concussions, jaw fractures, tooth loss, bruising to the face, and stress on the neck.

– Mouthguards that are custom are much more comfortable than standard ones, making you more likely to wear it.

When sports season comes in this fall, don’t let yourself or your children go unprotected—athletes can’t afford to ignore their oral health. Prevent injury, tooth fracture and loss, and perform optimally at your sport with a custom mouthguard this season.

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Gum Disease

People who have periodontal disease, or gum disease, are more likely to have heart attacks. Gum disease is usually the result of poor oral health, such as lack of brushing or improper brushing, little to no flossing, and not visiting your dentist regularly. With gum disease, plaque that forms on your teeth that has not been brushed away can form into tartar, a hard substance that is difficult to remove. This tartar can cause inflammation of the gums, causing your gums to pull back from your teeth, bleed, and harbor infection. This inflammation can be associated with inflammation in your arteries.

Oral Bacteria

This inflammation in your arteries could be the result of bad bacteria in your mouth traveling through your blood stream. The bacteria could encourage inflammation, therefore allowing for further buildup of plaque in your arteries. This could lead to artherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries. Artherosclerosis is a common cause of heart attack and stroke. This link makes it more important than ever to practice good oral hygiene in your daily life. Brushing, flossing, and visiting your dentist regularly helps, but speak with your dentist about proper brushing techniques as well. If you smoke, this is a great time to quit. Smoking can encourage bad bacteria to grow in your mouth and lead to gum disease.

Gingivitis

Even if you haven’t been diagnosed with gum disease, gingivitis, or inflammation of the gums, can be just as bad. Gingivitis is a prelude to gum disease and can still cause your gums to swell and bleed due to bad bacteria in the mouth, plaque, and tartar. Plaque can harden over a 24-48 hour period, meaning proper brushing once a day is enough, but brushing twice a day will alleviate your chances of getting gingivitis or gum disease even more. If you smoke or eat a lot of refined sugars in your diet or other acidic foods, brushing and rinsing with water when you can’t brush is important. Bad oral bacteria from gingivitis can make its way into your bloodstream and could potentially be harmful to blood vessels and encourage blood clot formation.

Your mouth is not a separate entity from the rest of your body—it is connected, and in a vital way. The mouth is the entryway for our nourishment and this entryway happens to be crammed with bacteria, both good and bad. By keeping up with proper oral hygiene and visiting your dentist, you can minimize bad bacteria and plaque, therefore leading to a healthy mouth and heart!

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The most common symptom of toothpaste allergy is a rash around the mouth that appears after brushing. The rash may be itchy, and it can spread to the chin, cheeks or even the nose. Toothpaste allergy can also cause canker sores, which are painful sores inside the mouth. Other symptoms of toothpaste allergy include gum inflammation, hives, respiratory issues, itchiness, red eyes and watery eyes. Toothpaste allergy can trigger anaphylaxis, which is an emergency situation that requires immediate medical treatment.

Cheilitis, which is dryness, cracking and irritation of the mouth, is a major symptom of toothpaste allergy. Cheilitis is also a symptom of yeast infection, so correct diagnosis is important if you experience this symptom.

Flavorings in toothpastes are a common allergen, particularly spearmint or peppermint oils. Other ingredients in toothpaste that can cause allergic reactions include propylene glycol, sodium benzoate and cocamidopropyl betaine. Toothpastes that advertise as being “natural” may cause less problems with irritation and sensitivity, but sometimes these toothpastes can have combinations of ingredients that can cause allergic reactions as well.

Some people are allergic to fluoride. Fluoride is good for your teeth because it keeps the enamel strong and reduces cavities, but anyone who is allergic to fluoride may have to opt for toothpaste that does not contain fluoride.

If you have allergic reactions or sensitivity to toothpaste, you may be able to ease symptoms by washing your face after brushing your teeth. You can also try using less toothpaste when you brush. Make sure you get a new toothbrush often, at least once a month, and use toothbrushes with soft bristles.

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Dental sealants are an excellent protection against tooth decay and cavities for children, who can get sealants when their first permanent teeth have come in. The procedure of getting sealants is simple and painless. The dentist first cleans the teeth and rinses them with water. A solution is then placed on the tooth or teeth to be sealed that creates a rough surface for the sealant to attach to. After a few minutes the solution is rinsed off and the teeth are dried. The liquid sealant itself is then painted on the surface of the teeth. The sealant is a plastic material that hardens and bonds to the tooth. After being placed on the teeth, the speed of the hardening process can be increased by the application of a light source to cure the sealant.

Dental sealants are ideal for children and can protect their most vulnerable teeth from problems early on, but adults can also get dental sealants. Dental sealants are strong and hold up well through normal chewing. They can last for years, and can be reapplied as needed. During regular dental checkups your dentist can check the condition of your sealants and recommend reapplication when necessary.

Dental sealants are generally clear or tooth-colored, so they cannot be seen on the teeth. Sealants can block out food particles and protect teeth against cavities and the need for fillings. Sealants can be placed on any teeth, but are usually placed on the back teeth. Teeth that already have fillings or are decayed cannot receive sealants.

Teeth that have been sealed still need proper care, including daily brushing and flossing and regular dental checkups. Fluoride toothpaste is recommended even if teeth are sealed, as it can provide extra protection against decay.

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