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Teens & Tobacco: Know the Risks

Today, Family Dental Health wants to give teens the bottom line about tobacco use: there is no such thing as a “safe” or “safer” tobacco product. Every tobacco product contains nicotine in varying amounts—and not only is nicotine addictive, but it can also harm the brain. (Many people don’t realize the brain continues developing until the mid-20s or even early-30s.)

• Cigarettes are usually made of tobacco and chemical additives in a paper casing. Inhaled smoke from a lit cigarette contains more than 7,000 harmful chemicals; at least 70 of them are linked to cancer. Smoking cigarettes damages almost every organ of the body and leads to diseases like oral cancer and lung cancer, heart disease and stroke.
• The “vaping” of e-cigarettes has become increasingly popular in recent years. These devices heat liquid into an aerosol that is then inhaled by the user. Many believe this aerosol is innocuous, but it actually contains many chemicals that are unsafe to breathe. Most e-cigarettes also contain nicotine.
• Smokeless tobacco is tobacco that is not burned and includes chewing, oral and spitting tobacco, dip, chew, and snuff. Smokeless tobacco has high levels of toxic chemicals, and users are at high risk of oral cancer.

Oral cancer is one of the fastest-growing cancers worldwide, and Family Dental Health wants all their young patients to enjoy long, healthy lives. Get in touch with us at Family Dental Health with any questions about tobacco use and oral health today.

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

What Are Maxillary Teeth?

The upper teeth formed along the maxillary jawbone are called “maxillary teeth” and include the top incisors, molars, premolars, and canines. Family Dental Health shares more information about maxillary teeth below.

Understanding the role of the upper teeth and caring for them properly is important in the fight against bacteria and infection in gum tissues and upper sinus cavities. Most maxillary teeth play specific roles in eating and digesting food, functioning as a set of silverware to break it down. 

Because maxillary teeth are so close to maxillary sinus cavities, it is easy to confuse a sinus infection with an infected tooth. If you visit Family Dental Health complaining of pain, they will determine which infection is present and either provide treatment or send you to your general physician.

If you have more questions about your child’s maxillary teeth—or ANY of their teeth—get in touch with Family Dental Health today!

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Special Needs Dentistry: Everyone Deserves a Healthy Smile!

The Americans with Disabilities Act defines disability as a “physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities.” (Specific examples of major life activities addressed by the ADA include functions such as caring for one’s self, performing manual tasks, walking, seeing, hearing, speaking, breathing and learning.) 

Disabilities may be congenital (present from birth) or develop later in life. If your child is living with a disability, you know how deeply important access to quality, compassionate medical care is, and that includes oral healthcare. At Family Dental Health, we want to help every person we treat develop and maintain a healthy, happy smile, and we believe being inclusive of children with special needs is an essential part of this mission. 

There is much to be considered when customizing care for individuals with special needs, from ramps, entryways, office furniture, space, and atmosphere, to the technology we use and the amount of time scheduled for appointments. Family Dental Health considers all of it and more to provide quality and compassionate care for kids with special needs. Tailored treatment plans may include sedation and anesthesia, which can really improve dental experiences for our patients with special needs as well as those with dental fears and phobias.

Don’t hesitate to get in touch with Family Dental Health with your questions, concerns, or comments, or just to schedule an appointment to come in and see us!

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Why Are My Child’s Teeth Bumpy?

What are mamelons teeth?

If you’re a new parent, whether your babe’s teeth are just emerging or they’re starting to fall out, you might wonder, “What are those bumps on their front teeth?” 

Mamelons teeth appear in the front of the mouth (the incisors) both on top and bottom and are characterized by bumpy ridges. These ridges are completely natural and form as a result of enamel fusing together during the development process under the gums. 

Mamelons typically don’t last very long, as they’re quickly worn down with biting and chewing motions. If bite problems prevent mamelons from being worn down, your child may require orthodontics, or we can file them down for a smoother smile.

Get in touch

If you have any questions or you’re ready to schedule a visit with your Portland dentist, Dr. David Case at Family Dental Health, contact us today to schedule a visit!

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Can Children Have Gum Disease?

The smallest smiles in your family are as vulnerable to oral health issues as you are—likely even more so! Your oral hygiene regimen may already be thorough enough to keep your teeth free from cavities and your gums safe from gingivitis, but young ones typically need help brushing and flossing for years before their skills match yours. 

Family Dental Health wants to assist you on your mission to keep your child’s smile healthy, so we’re here to fill you in on what we see often, but want to help you and your little ones avoid.

Get in touch with us.

If you have any questions or you’d like to schedule a visit with Portland dentist, Dr. David Case to ensure your child’s smile is developing healthily, contact Family Dental Health today!

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Oral Hygiene for Families on the Go

Today’s families seem to be busier than they were in the past—lots of homework, extracurricular activities, and hopefully, some quality time spent with the family. Here are a few ideas from Family Dental Health to make consistent oral hygiene a little more convenient:

• Brushing teeth in the shower:  as hard as it is to get your teenager out the door for school, this just may work—even though it probably won’t save water! And speaking of water…
• Water bottles everywhere: in backpacks, purses, and cars. Anything you or your child drinks that isn’t water—in other words, any liquid that tastes good—is either acidic or will turn into the acids that cause tooth decay. Teach kids to swish and spit with water after food and non-water beverages.
• Gum with xylitol for a treat: Xylitol has been shown to prevent cavities. Read those labels, you may be pleasantly surprised!
• Dental travel kits for the car: fill them with water, extra toothbrushes, toothpaste, floss, healthy snacks, and reusable straws. (Why straws? They help sugar from coating kids’ teeth.)
• Interactive toothbrushes: fluoride toothpaste is a lot more fun if your toothbrush speaks like a favorite movie character, makes cool noises, or plays a song.

If you’re looking for a dentist that sees kids in the Portland area, make an appointment with Family Dental Health today!

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Social Stories: Support for Kids with Autism

In this blog article, Dr. Case discusses Social Stories™ and how they help provide emotional support to autistic kids with the goal of improving their dental (and other) experiences.

A social story about going to the dentist follows specific criteria and story elements to reinforce a safe, detailed description of a dental visit in a way that is both meaningful and comfortable for children with autism or related challenges. This short story tool outlines the relevant social cues and common responses when visiting Family Dental Health for an appointment. The story also explains what happens in that situation and why those things occur.

The physical form social stories take can vary. Some are simple verbal messages that you’ll share with your child as you would any other story. Some are printed materials with or without drawings or photos, while others may be in video form. 

We’d love to help your child learn about their health and good oral hygiene habits. If you need a compassionate dentist in Portland, get in touch with Family Dental Health today!

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Is My Child’s Oral Hygiene Routine Sufficient?

A child’s happy, healthy smile is a source of pride and joy for parents—and dentists, too! For this reason, you’ll likely spend a good deal of time helping them develop superb oral hygiene routines to ensure they keep their teeth for life. 

When you’re just getting started, you may have a lot of questions. We recommend bringing your baby into the Dr. Case at Family Dental Health as soon as their first tooth emerges, and we can show you how to care for their smiles as they grow and change including brushing and flossing techniques, fluoride, and more.

Looking for more guidance?

If you have any questions or you’d like to schedule a visit for your little one to see Portland dentist, Dr. Case at Family Dental Health, contact us at Family Dental Health today!

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Buds for Life: Your Tongue & Taste

Full disclosure before your Portland dentist Dr. Case at Family Dental Health starts dropping knowledge on the muscles in your mouth that are partially to thank (or blame) for the foods you love: we’re hungry as we write this and are envisioning pizza; yummy, savory pizza with cheese that stretches when you grab a slice, crust with just the right amount of crunch, sauce with the best blend of veggies and herbs…what were we going to talk about? Oh yeah, taste buds! Wait—are you craving pizza now, too? Let’s go halfsies on some ‘za!

Gusta-what?!

The scientific term for your taste buds is gustatory receptor cells. Jot that down because there will be a quiz later (we joke). These taste buddies (that’s just more fun to say, isn’t it?) form before we evacuate the womb. In fact, based on their sensitivity to sweet and bitter tastes, newborns may have more taste buds than adults. For an image to distract from the pizza that may still be on your mind, picture babies trying new foods. Need help? That’s what we’re here for! Here are babies tasting lemons in slow motion.

A common belief about taste buds is that they’re the bumps visible on your tongue, but those are papillae that exist to give your tongue the rough texture that helps you eat—your taste buds cover these papillae but can only be seen with a microscope. A person can have anywhere from 2,000 to 10,000 taste buds co-existing with bacteria in their mouths, and the number of bacteria present? That can range anywhere from 1,000 to 100,000 on each tooth’s surface and jump to 100 million or a whopping 1 billion bacteria in a mouth that needs flossing and brushing.

Why’d We Mention Bacteria?

We’re sorry to derail the humor train, but Dr. Case would be remiss not to mention the importance of oral hygiene when it comes to tongue talk. Your tongue is a favorite haven for bacteria and food debris, after all, and neglecting to give it quality time with your trusty toothbrush and friendly floss (or alternatives like the WaterPik®) can carry consequences like cavities, gum disease, bad breath, and alteration of your taste buds! Do you know how food is harder to taste when you’re fighting an infection or virus? It’s like that, and we think this further highlights the oral-systemic link.

The oral-systemic link is the term used to describe how your body’s systems work together to keep you going strong, or work against you to make you feel crummy (not to be confused with crumbly like a cookie). Your mouth is a gateway—your taste buds being on the roof of your mouth and your upper esophagus, cheeks, and epiglottis (the flap of cartilage that covers your windpipe while you swallow food or liquid to prevent you from inhaling it and choking) illustrate this for us. 

Your Tongue Isn’t the Only Thing with Taste

For another example of how your systems work together, get a whiff of how the nose operates in conjunction with your taste buds. Your olfactory receptors send signals to the brain about whether the food you’re about to consume or reject is spicy, fatty, sugary, salty, and/or acidic—because food can be almost as complex as your body, can’t it? And yes, we did mention the brain! 

Your brain is what provides you with the sense of satisfaction you feel when eating something you love. Your brain’s participation in the consumption process is further evidenced by the ability scientists have to turn taste “on” or “off” by stimulating or silencing clusters of brain cells. (Does this mean they could make onions more palatable to people that don’t usually like them? Maybe! But so far, testing has only been conducted on mice.)

Other Fun Tongue Facts

• Contrary to a somewhat popular belief, your tongue’s ability to taste sweet, savory, salty, sour, and bitter is not relegated to different sections—your whole tongue senses these equally.
• Each person’s tongue is as unique as their fingerprints.
• The size of your tongue can contribute to disorders like Obstructive Sleep Apnea. 
• The average tongue is about three inches in length, with the longest recorded being 3.97 inches.
• Taste buds have an average lifespan of 10 days but can be killed sooner if you burn your tongue on hot beverages or foods. Not to worry—most taste buds regenerate!
• Your sense of smell and taste change with age, which may mean loss of the ability to distinguish between savory, sweet, salty, sour, and bitter. This could be why some of us love hot sauce and add more of it to our food as we grow wiser (the term we prefer to older, thank you!).

We hope you enjoyed reading about your tongue and that it inspires you to treat it kindly along with the rest of your mouth. One of the best ways to show it some love is by scheduling an appointment with your Portland dentist, Dr. Case of Family Dental Health, to make sure everything is in tip-top shape! 

The content of this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.

Late for an Important Date: When Baby Teeth Don’t Fall Out

Most kids lose their baby teeth—also called primary teeth—in a distinct sequence at set intervals.  Children’s baby teeth come out naturally starting around age six, becoming progressively looser as they fall out (sometimes with a little extra wiggling because the Tooth Fairy is expected to visit). 

Sometimes baby tooth loss doesn’t happen in the usual order, and a permanent tooth appears prior to the loss of the primary tooth, which leads to a double row of front teeth. While this is a common pediatric dental concern that should be addressed, it is no cause for alarm and rarely has long-term negative effects. 

When the loss of a primary tooth and subsequent eruption of a permanent tooth takes over a year longer than the anticipated date, that primary tooth is considered over-retained. Are you concerned because your child’s baby tooth isn’t falling out, or the permanent tooth hasn’t appeared yet? Portland dentist, Dr. David Case at Family Dental Health, discusses over-retained baby teeth and possible treatment options below.

Baby Teeth Need Assessment

Baby teeth should be checked routinely by a dentist so abnormalities can be identified and treated early for your child’s long-term oral health and comfort.

The first step when assessing a child’s over-retained baby tooth is a comprehensive oral examination that includes a thorough exam with digital x-rays. Condition, color, shape, and position of the over-retained tooth must be evaluated in case it is fused to the bone, a condition known as ankylosis. When ankylosis occurs, the affected tooth appears sunken in the gums and is unable to come out on its own.

What Are Some Causes Over-Retained Baby Teeth?

The most common cause for an over-retained primary tooth is the absence of a permanent tooth to take its place. When the baby and permanent teeth are developing as they should, the permanent tooth will push on and eventually dissolve the primary tooth root, facilitating its loss so the permanent tooth can take its rightful place in the jaw. 

In up to 7% of cases, permanent teeth are absent, which occurs more frequently in girls than boys. Other possible causes for over-retained primary teeth include obstruction, trauma, infection, environmental factors, endocrine disorders, genetics, and misalignment or delayed eruption of the permanent tooth underneath.

What are the Risks of Not Treating Over-Retained Baby Teeth?

Over-retained primary teeth can lead to other serious dental issues later, which is why early assessment and treatment is beneficial. Periodontal (gum) problems, cavities, and misalignment of adjacent permanent teeth can occur if over-retained baby teeth are left untreated.

Treatment Options for Over-Retained Baby Teeth

The condition of the over-retained tooth or teeth and the surrounding structures of the mouth determine the best treatment for your little one. If the child has several over-retained teeth, it is likely that several permanent teeth below are missing. If this is the case, an orthodontist should evaluate your child in addition to your dentist so an acceptable treatment solution can be carefully planned and executed for optimal end results.

If the over-retained baby tooth is structurally strong and satisfactory in appearance, that tooth can be retained. If the tooth is strong but looks unattractive, its aesthetics can be improved with a dental restoration.

If the primary tooth is crooked, extraction is the best option for two reasons: 1) the gap can be closed later with orthodontic treatment; or 2) an absent tooth can be replaced with a fixed bridge or dental implant. A dental implant is currently the superior option due to aesthetics, functionality, jawbone health, and higher rates of success.

If you have questions or concerns about your child’s over-retained baby teeth, your Portland dentist at Family Dental Health would be happy to welcome you and your child for examination and treatment. We’d love to hear from you—contact Family Dental Health today!

The content on this blog is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.