For many years the public has been inundated with all sorts of messages about cavities and tools on how to prevent them. As much as I wish I could tip my cap to organized dentistry most of the messages the public receive come from the manufacturers of toothbrushes, toothpaste and oral rinses and I, for one, am grateful to Crest, Colgate et al.
However, there are some very disturbing trends being reported in literature and that we have seen as Southern California Dental Health Associates right here in the Los Angeles/Beverly Hills area. We are seeing teenagers and young adults with very high rates of cavities, in some cases where one could argue that the ideal treatment includes a combination of crowns and fillings. The recommended treatment has a financial cost, time cost and an emotional cost. But more than that, when dentistry is done there is the strong possibility that it will eventually fail and need to be redone and whenever it is redone you increase the risks of needing root canals, the eventual loss of the teeth and other issues.
One of the other aspects that we are very aware of at Southern California Dental Health Associates is that if you just “fix” the teeth all you have done is taken care of the results of a rather complicated infection but the infection source still remains. Even if the patient changes their habits, if the source of the infection is not taken care of, they remain at high risk of breakdown.
The usual suspects in the disease of cavities are
1. Bacteria (too much bacteria. Or the bacteria acting badly)
2. pH
3. Diet (too much sugar or eating too frequently)
4. Saliva (very important for the early reversal of the cavity process)
5. Genetics
Please refer back to a previous blog published on Oct 24, 2013 for more details about these usual suspects. And we do have the tools (the CariFree system, ozone, probiotics and more) to help reduce the usual suspects but in order to make a difference it requires a very coordinated effort of teamwork between the patient and the team at our office. It requires work, sometimes a fair amount of it, on the part of the patient. And this holds true for any patient at any office. Any dentist can deliver the highest quality of care to a patient, but if the patient is not willing to make the changes to help insure the results, then the dentistry will fail and the mouth will continue to breakdown.
I wrote the above to share with you something I see coming in the future. The amount of sugar in the American diet (and is some cases other’s as well) is rising at an alarming rate. Coca Cola executives claim there is no evidence that sugar is addicting. The soft drink industry spends millions of dollars to stop extra taxes on their products that have no nutritional value at all, but exact a toll on the public, not only with problems of cavities, but obesity and diabetes just to name a few. The blame does not lie only with soft drink makes, but the food industry as a whole. And unfortunately if the rate of cavities continues to go up you will find the dentists being crucified, because dentistry is not inexpensive. But I want to share with you that I don’t believe anyone will have the guts to go against the food industry (which in my humble opinion is by far the most powerful industry in our country, much more that insurance or drug companies).
I will close with this statement. All dental disease can be prevented. It takes strong support of the parents of young kids (parents actually pass the bacteria that causes cavities to their own kids), it takes due diligence on the home care front and it takes eating right. This is where as a society we have failed ourselves. It doesn’t have to be that way. If you have any questions about this please don’t hesitate to call our office and make an appointment to see how you can stop the vicious cycle of dental disease.