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Can My Child Skip Visits to the Dentist?

You may think of our team at Family Dental Health as part of your child’s defensive line keeping them safe from gum disease and tooth decay, but we’re also myth busters! You’ve probably heard one of the most common misconceptions we have to challenge: dentistry isn’t important until after children lose their baby teeth. 

The truth is that oral health routines should be developed right from the beginning, and visiting the dentist is a foundational part of creating healthy habits.

From the beginning?

That’s right! There are tips you’ll want to follow as your little one’s smile forms and grows, and around the time you’re celebrating their first birthday, you’ll want to schedule their first dental visit. For an overview of why early introductions are crucial and what you can do to keep them on the right track before this milestone, we invite you to come to see us!

If you have any questions or you’d like to schedule a visit with Portland dentist, Dr. David Case to get your kids started on their smile journey, 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.

Prepare Your Child for Dental Visits with a Good Book!

When you’ve got your child’s first dental visit noted on the calendar, you might feel more anxious than they do as you approach the big day. At Family Dental Health, we want to help both of you relax and see there’s nothing to fear about having your smile cared for. Our team is kind and gentle, and though our technology might seem intimidating, it’s all geared toward increasing comfort while we get a clear picture of the condition of your little one’s oral health.

Knowledge is Power

We think one of the main reasons visiting the dentist can seem scary is because of the unknown. If you know more about what to expect, it’s easier to get comfortable in the chair! We want you and your young one to be informed and as prepared as possible, so we’re sharing this list of children’s books you can read together before we have the pleasure of sharing smiles with you.

Do you and your child have a favorite children’s book about going to the dentist? We’d love to hear about it! Contact Family Dental Health to let us know, and to schedule a visit with your Portland dentist, Dr. David Case.

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.

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.

Social Stories: Support for Kids with Autism

In this blog article, Family Dental Health 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.

Grandparents, Grandkids & Dental Care

Family Dental Health has been thinking about how much things have changed in the world of dentistry since today’s grandparents were growing kids themselves. Grandparents today are often very involved in the daily lives of their grandchildren—they may live close by, provide financial assistance, or assume childcare responsibilities for working parents. Since oral hygiene and dietary habits are established in childhood, it’s important that grandparents’ dental education is on point. 

There are a lot of basic facts that grandparents may or may not know about dentistry, such as:

• Definitions of dental terms
• The availability of specialized toothbrushes and toothpaste for kids
• Sending kids to bed with juice, milk, or formula in their bottles can contribute to tooth decay
• That oral health is systemically linked to overall health
• The important role of baby teeth in future dental development
• The advantages that fluoride treatments and dental sealants may provide
• The capabilities of modern technology in dental diagnoses and treatments

If your child’s grandparents are part of your family’s daily routine and you think they could use a refresher on their dental knowledge, contact Family Dental Health and bring the whole family to your next appointment—we’d love to meet all of you!

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.

Can F’s on Dental Checkups Cause F’s in School?

Going to school and getting an education are essential components of a child’s development, and they take the things they learn with them for the rest of their lives. No matter what type of school children attend, their support system at home has a great deal to do with not only their feelings about school, but how well they perform there. 

You may be surprised to learn that children with favorable oral health are more likely to achieve success in school. School attendance is integral to academic achievement, but dental conditions are to blame for 51 million lost school hours among children every year—and dental pain is linked to poorer performance when kids do make it to class. Portland dentist, Dr. Case, shares more about this topic below.

Research Finds…

A 2008 study conducted by the North Carolina Child Health Assessment and Monitoring Program examined risk factors for poor performance among school-aged children. Risk factors included school absences and performance, oral health status, parental education level, health insurance coverage, race, and gender. 

Children in poor oral health were three times as likely to miss school due to dental pain; school absences from dental pain were linked to poor school performance, while school absences from routine dental care showed no correlation between poor school performance and missing class. 

The study ultimately classified children in poor oral health as being up to 40 percent more likely to have trouble in school, further citing low levels of parental education, low socioeconomic status, and below-average overall health to poor academic performance. The study concluded that the improvement of children’s oral health status could be a vehicle to enhance their school experience and progress.

The American Journal of Public Health expanded on the North Carolina study in a 2011 article, acknowledging that former U.S. Surgeon General, C. Everett Koop, had officially acknowledged the relationship between oral health and overall health as far back as the early 1980s and that subsequent health officials had reinforced that acknowledgment. The 2011 article indicated that dental caries (cavities) in children are the most prevalent childhood disease, occurring 5 to 8 times more often than asthma, the second most common childhood illness. Chronic illness affects the quality of life—and for most children, life includes school. 

School-Based Oral Health Programs

Some schools have taken steps to promote better oral hygiene among students. School-based programs like these may include oral health education, fluoride rinses, dental screenings, and even dental sealants to prevent tooth decay. The advantage of programs like these is that they reach children who may not have access to pediatric dentistry, but they are only available in regions with the financial resources to sustain them.

Good Oral Health Habits Start at Home

Good oral hygiene is the foundation of oral health and wellness. Brushing at least twice each day and flossing once each day is a great place to start. Drinking and rinsing with water after meals and snacks also can also make the mouth a little cleaner between brushing.

If you have any questions about oral health and your child’s school performance, your Portland dentist at Family Dental Health can help you find answers. Give us a call or schedule an appointment with us 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.