Yeah, there was no title last time, I was just being lazy.
Here's one more video.
We'd heard about this idea that was going to be tried out, but I'll confess I didn't know they had started using it already. "Access to care" is something we hear about a lot and this quarter we started our Pediatric Dentistry class. Nationally 80% of tooth problems occur within 20% of the population. Here in California, 40% of kids will have at least one cavity by the time they're 5, and 50% will have a cavity by the time they're 6. Not a statistic any dentist at the school is proud of. The goal is to prevent this from happening and try to help the (usually) underserved/undereducated/lower socioeconomic families take care of their teeth before problems happen. If teeth need to be pulled early because of severe decay, that causes problems in the permanent teeth growing in, which leads to more decay, which leads to those people losing their teeth at an earlier than average age. The goal is to help people keep their teeth their whole life.
Near the end of last year, a professor gave a great lecture on Animal dentitions. He had a collection of various animal skulls and went through a lecture of various animals and animal types and the teeth they have and what they're used for. One point he emphasized was that if animals don't have teeth, they die. And even most who die (aside from being eaten) with their teeth, die due to a tooth infection/abscess. Especially herbivores. He had the skull of a gorilla who died from a tooth abscess and passed it around. There were actually multiple abscesses, but only one was really big and made a hole deep into the center of the skull and got into the large veins there and blood stream. Crazy.
Fortunately we can pull teeth out or fill them or crown them, or replace them, sort of, but that's not so fun. Nothing is as good as real tooth.
Moral of the non-story: Take care of your teeth, and help your kids take care of their teeth. Recommendations from the Pediatric dental association: Have an exam on your kids just after their first teeth come in, and have a "dental home" for them by the time they're a year old. Easier said than done, I know. Grace has seen a dentist once in her life about 6 months ago and she's almost 4, but Em or I brush her teeth every night as part of her bedtime ritual.
Part of a table that I'll be tested on tomorrow for the "Pedo" Final is about flouride for kids. Ideal is about 1 part per million in drinking water for a mostly topical effect to help keep teeth from dissolving/decaying. Since our water is fluoridated to that level, we don't need to use a fluoride toothpaste for Grace while she's this young, especially since she gets good care of her teeth. Kids that don't get fluoride in their water and help taking care of their teeth, fluoride supplements are recommended up to .25mg day for under 3 years old, up to .5mg/day for up to 6, and up to 1mg/day up to 16.
Look at that, I must be ready for the final (except that I had to look those numbers up just now...)
4 comments:
Okay, so I was worried about taking Luke to the dentist and my dentist said not to bring him until he was 5 years old! He also said to brush his teeth with water. I am genuinely confused now because I assume you get better info than my old dentist since you are in school.
Yeah, it's not recommended to use normal toothpaste with kids until they know well enough to spit it out and not eat it. A lot of the childrens toothpastes don't have fluoride and are more for "training" kids to use toothpaste properly and getting used to it. Grace likes her Princess toothpaste because it's pink, has sparkles in it, and has the Disney Princesses on it.
The guidelines for when to have kids see a dentist come from here:
http://www.aapd.org/
It would be a very good idea to have your kids go see a dentist early, just in case. Especially once most of their teeth are in. Even if there's nothing wrong, the act of going to see a dentist regularly seems to keep people taking better care of their teeth in between visits. Also, problems can be caught and taken care of easier earlier.
Thanks for the link to the guidelines!
Can you call me sometime when you have a sec. to talk about this? Isaac went to the dentist for his 3rd visit this past week. He has severe tooth decay. You can see black already. He needs a filling in each of his molars and a cap on one of them the xray showed decay down to the root. I feel awful about this because OF COURSE I've done something wrong. The dentist and hyginist tried to tell me not to feed him juice, fruit snacks, crackers. Those are things I don't purchase. I've limited his juice to 4 oz. a day ever since he was 2? Is it possible for him to have bad teeth from the beginning? Is it too late for him? Should I get a 2nd opinion? Sorry to ask so many questions. Been thinking about you since our visit. xoxo
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