Beverage Tragedy for Infants

Not many people until recently recognized the tragedy of introducing juice to infants. Dentists have known for a couple of decades that juice is a primary factor in the growing problem of cavities in young children, particularly infants. Recently, however, the medical community has also recognized that juice is a primary factor in a number of childhood disease issues that have grown in the last couple decades. There are several serious issues that result from introducing infants to juice rather than water during the time of weaning from milk.

First, and perhaps most obvious is that the repeated exposure of sugary acidic beverages such as all fruit juices and other sweet beverages creates an incredibly rich cavity causing environment in the mouth. Children develop cavities at an extremely high rate when juice is part of their infant diet. Often the cavities are so severe and the child so young we have to take the children to the hospital and restore the teeth under general anesthesia.

Bad Teeth...Bad Grades!

A recent study at USC and published in the Journal of Public Health verifies that children with poor oral health have, on average, lower grades. They also miss more days of school due to tooth aches and dental appointments. It also pointed out that parents of these students miss more days of work due to the need to care for their children's dental appointments.

One of the tragedies here is to know this is so simple to prevent, though without adequate information, parents find it difficult to accomplish. An early start (age 1) with good instruction will demonstrate to parents how simple it is to give children an excellent start to a lifetime of good oral health.  Cavity free, healthy, beautiful smiles.

Chocolate Milk Makes Cavities!

Chocolate milk is candy.  Granted it has milk protein and calcium, but the sugar ratio to other nutrients still makes it candy.  As for its ability to make cavities, it is less of a problem than juice and sports drinks because it is not acidic like them.  I put it on the same scale as chocolate candy, except we do not nibble on chocolate candy multiple times a day every day.  Infants and toddlers who drink chocolate milk do sip on it at multiple opportunities during the day.  Some have it in a sippy cup or bottle and sip on it all day.  As you might expect, these kids develop a high rate of cavities early in life* and they establish an oral bacterial balance around their teeth that will plague them their entire life.**

If your child is already “addicted”*** to the sweet flavor of chocolate milk, there are a couple options for you.

1) Adamantly restrict chocolate milk to one glass at mealtime when it will be mixed with the other foods of the meal.  Note:  If you can do this you are a committed person (and tougher than me).  If children are used to having chocolate milk throughout the day, and they know it is in the house, they will insist on having it as usual and you will have a small war (demands, crying & tantrums) on your hands.  My experience with small wars with children is that they win … every time.  They don’t understand losing and they will persist until they win.

Flimsy (Disposable) Flossers

Basically I love anything that makes dental flossing easier or more convenient. As I tell the kids in my

practice repeatedly, "The people who don't floss keep me busy doing fillings. I would rather be busy teaching patients how to have healthy beautiful smiles.

The little disposable Flossers are convenient to have around and have been made cute and attractive for kids.  I have come to discover, however that they are too flimsy for the younger kids to be using.  They don't understand the importance of getting that floss down past the tight place between the teeth.  They haven't developed the feel of knowing the floss is doing the right thing. The Flossers are too flimsy and don't get through the most important real tight places the highest risk kids have. They also have to get their fingers in the mouth to get the job done right, which kids are not very coordinated about.

Sealants Prevent Cavities in Kids

Most of my writing focuses on what we can do as parents to improve and safeguard the oral health of our kids and whole family.  However, there are a few things that your dentist can do to prevent cavities.  Sealants are one of them!  The following is information from a recent study done by Delta Dental, one of the largest dental insurers in the country.  They are very interested in whether the money they spend for their client's oral health is effective!

Cavities are almost entirely preventable, and a recent study shows that sealants — especially when combined with professional fluoride treatments — are among the best tools to help children fight tooth decay early in their lives. However, the study also cites sealants recently ranking ninth in children’s dental procedures, suggesting a lack of community awareness about sealant effectiveness.

Perinatal Care Benefits Your Baby's Teeth

Mom’s oral health is clearly related to a healthy pregnancy, healthy delivery and healthy baby.  However, 2/3 of women do not seek dental care during their pregnancy!  Though it is perceived by most that dental care should be avoided during pregnancy, that couldn’t be farther from the truth.

What is real is:

1) Dental care can be administered anytime during the pregnancy without undue risk to the baby.  A thorough examination in the first trimester would reveal what would be recommended to maximize mom’s oral health and the unborn child’s health.  Emergency work can be done immediately to avoid infection developing.  Significant extensive work is done best during the second trimester, after mother’s morning sickness has subsided and before weight gain makes it uncomfortable to sit in the dental chair.

2) Creating good oral health early in the pregnancy will ensure against the need for antibiotics or pain medications that may carry risk for the developing baby.

Tips for Optimum Oral Heath During Pregnancy

Pregnant?  Your and your baby’s optimum oral health and general health can begin today!

In a previous blog I emphasized how important oral health is to the health of your pregnancy and your baby.  What can you do now, even before a good dental examination to maximize your oral health?

Gum Chewers and Mint Poppers 
If you chew gum or use mints, be sure to buy ones with xylitol as the first ingredient, and preferably the only sweetener in the ingredients list.  Xylitol is well documented as a cavity-preventing sweetener.  Find xylitol (gum, mints, toothpaste, etc.) at your health food store, Internet, and checkout stand (spry, glee, ice cubes, frost, epic, & more).

Then vs Now: Why So Many Cavities?

The rising number of cavities the last 30 years, especially in children, has far outgrown the dental industry’s ability to fill the cavities!  There are simply not enough dentists.  How could this be?  We only need to go back a couple hundred years and cavities were not a problem for anyone except the Royalty and the rich.  Only the rich had dentists, typically in the royal court.  And there is our first clue.

Only the rich could afford the sugar, which needed to be shipped around the world to be used in the Royal Court’s confections and white pastries.  There is a second clue.  Refined white flour, when cooked, becomes a cooked starch that is capable of feeding the bacteria that cause cavities.  Additionally, the starch sticks between the teeth (flour and water paste) where it holds dissolved sugars from a variety of otherwise healthy foods like fruits.

Tooth Brush and Spit – DON’T Rinse

Since 1999, when John Featherstone PhD published his new data on the mechanisms of Fluoride in oral fluoride mouth rinse after brushing for the express purpose of leaving fluoride on their teeth.  The same concept can be accomplished by merely leaving the residual toothpaste on your teeth.

health, I and many prevention oriented colleagues have promoted the concept that one should not rinse after brushing one’s teeth.  Just spit the excess foam out and leave the residual toothpaste on your teeth.  After all, don’t we tell you the same after your dental appointment where we give you a fluoride application and tell you not to eat or rinse for 30 minutes?  Many folks will use a

If you like to rinse with a mouthwash for other than a fluoride based reason, then I would recommend waiting at least 30 minutes after brushing if you are going to use a non-fluoride mouth rinse.

Is a Waterpik better than Flossing?

Is a Waterpik better than flossing?

They actually have different purposes. Flossing removes plaque (bacterial biofilm) from teeth to prevent it from creating cavities, gingivitis and periodontitis. It is also effective removing irritating and unsightly bits and pieces of food.

 The Waterpik and other oral irrigation devices are excellent for removing food stuff from hard to reach places like periodontal defects caused by periodontitis and the nooks and crannies around braces.  However the Waterpik will not remove the sticky biofilm called plaque and that is what creates the acids and toxins that damage teeth and gums.

If you want to improve your oral health you will need something mechanically abrasive like the floss and toothbrush and other oral health instruments to rub that plaque off.

Cavity Germs (plaque) Finder

Cavity Germs (plaque) Finder.

Sally, if you were a tasty bug and you were hiding in the grass so a bird would not find you and eat you, what color would you like to be?

Sally: "Green!"

Exactly! So if you are a cavity causing germ hiding on a tooth, what color would you be?

Sally: "White?"

Right again!  That makes them invisible on your teeth. So when you brush your teeth, how do you know if you got them clean?

Sally, "Hmmm. I don't know. I can't see the germs."

2 Minutes 2 Times

Brush your child's teeth for 2 minutes, 2 times a day!

As I have told you in previous blogs, doing fillings and crowns on teeth does not improve oral health or dental health. Effective prevention of dental disease requires a little simple education of the patient and the desire to have healthy, cavity free beautiful smiles. With that in mind the California Dental Association and American Academy of Pediatric Dentists and 12 other organizations have started a nationwide educational program designed to help patients improve their own oral health and prevent cavities.


2min2x.org is the website it will originate from and where you can find all the information needed to create oral health for you and your children. It includes great videos to educate, entertain and motivate your children to want and achieve good oral health.  Check it out!

Winning With Smiles - Pediatric Dentistry
Meadow Vista, California 95722

Clean Molars, Ugly Smile?

CLEAN MOLARS, UGLY SMILE?

At every check-up for our patients we use disclosing solution to display for our patients where their most recent brushing/flossing was successful and where it was lacking.  We then give them the opportunity to take brush and/or floss and do a "practice" cleaning of their own teeth.  This helps them feel what they need to do differently to improve their cleaning effectiveness.  We also have "disclosing tablets" on hand for them to take home and do little training sessions themselves at home.

Most patients are surprised to find they are cleaning their molars more effectively than their front teeth.  Most of us think we are getting our front teeth the cleanest and need more effort in the back.  The truth is, the cheek muscles have little leverage against the tooth brush and so the brush gets the whole tooth easily.  The lips, on the other hand, are great protectors of our gums around our front teeth.  Their orientation allows them to interfere with the tooth brush and handle, preventing the brush from quite reaching the gum line.  The end result can be devastating!

Clean Teeth-Healthy Teeth, Simple!

CLEAN TEETH - HEALTHY TEETH,  SIMPLE

The reality is very simple. If you want beautiful looking teeth, brush
them well twice a day!

If you want healthy teeth and gums that will last a lifetime, floss
them all once a day.

 And you can get artistic about this too! ...
Don't floss all your teeth, just the ones you want to keep.

Did you know there are no studies that have shown tooth brushing will
prevent cavities?

So take your pick.  You can have beautiful teeth (brush) or you can
have healthy teeth (floss) or you could choose BOTH.

Want to see more tips for your Dental Care, click HERE for ,Scott Thompson,DDS
Winning With Smiles - Pediatric Dentistry

Four Corner Flossing

Cavity free kids and keeping it simple.  Kids who enjoy going to the dentist and consistently belong to the "No Cavity Club." That's what we parents want, right?

After age 3 about 90% of the cavities are in 4 locations.  Between the molars in the 4 corners of the mouth. If I could get parents to spend 10 seconds each evening flossing these 4 spots, it would nearly eliminate all the cavities I have to fix.  And I do mean 10 seconds!

Here is how I did it. At story time each evening the kids brought a book and I brought some floss. Each in turn would lay on the couch with head in my lap, mouth open and looking up at me. It is an easy view of upper and lower teeth and I am not chasing a bobble-head.  Zig zag the floss between the molars so it does not snap as it goes past the tight spot.  Snap it back out.  Four corners and you are finished. After a couple nights practice you will discover this takes about 10 seconds, really! 

A Bad Start for Oral Health

A bad tooth day for your children.

Are you setting your children up for poor oral health? Many people talk about soft teeth or hard teeth that run in their families. Research, however, has never been able to demonstrate hard teeth or soft teeth. Instead, our dental health depends on what we develop during the first three years of life.

Cavities are contagious. Cavities are caused by contagious bacteria.  We get them from our caretakers such as our parents or nannies or grandparents and occasionally even friends.  Are you creating a good start or bad start for your children?

During the first three years of life we develop the bacterial balance in our mouths that will likely last a lifetime. If we are sharing spoons, glasses, slobbery kisses and other fun parent child engagements, then we will pick up the bacteria that inhabit our mouths from those people.

Do Fillings and Crowns improve your Dental Health?

Fillings and crowns do not improve your dental health.

For those of us who go to the dentist regularly, this may be an alarming statement.  We have spent a large sum of money on that dental work.  Repairing the damages of dental disease is very expensive. The thought that it does nothing to improve my state of dental disease is un-nerving!

But just think for a moment. The disease that caused your cavity in the first place started on a perfectly healthy tooth.  The disease created the hole (cavity) in your tooth.  Repairing that hole restores, to an extent, the integrity of the tooth; true enough.    However, it is easy to realize that filling the hole does nothing about the disease that started the hole in the first place.  The disease is still capable of creating another hole.  Unless you have done something additional, the disease still exists as before.  Repairing the damage of dental disease does nothing to reduce the disease itself!!

The cost of dental disease is very high.  The price of dental health, on the other hand, is very low.  Toothpaste, toothbrush, dental floss and 2 minutes a day is very inexpensive.

 

The one ingredient most people lack is the ability to evaluate themselves and know that their 2 minute effort each day was 100% effective. And that skill is not hard to learn!  It is also easy to teach, though few dental practices today take the time to do it.

 Be sure your dental professional is teaching you how to "disclose" (bring out of hiding) dental plaque.  It is the bacteria in dental plaque that modulate the disease.  You can also look at our website under "dental health" for a photo essay.

Ask your dental professional to show you, disclose, the bacteria causing your dental disease problems.  Then ask them to give you the time to brush the bacteria out so your hands "feel" what it takes.  Then ask them to evaluate with you your effectiveness and coach you with helpful tips. 

We do that with every check-up before we do any professional cleaning of a patient's teeth.  With a little practice, every patient can become totally effective in managing their dental disease.  With every check-up the professional "cleaning" requires less work.  Patients who have effectively learned how to manage the disease causing bacteria in their mouths do not need their teeth professionally cleaned every 6 months.  And they only need a light cleaning at their annual visit, even if they are regular coffee drinkers. 

Dental disease is under control, smiles are bright, new cavities are no longer a worry, fillings last longer - sometimes forever, and the wallet feels healthier too!

Want to learn more about great dental health, click HERE for Winningwithsmiles.com

Dentistry Expensive?

Is Dentistry Expensive?

Oral health. Is it expensive or not? The answer is that oral health is not expensive. Oral disease on the other hand is very expensive, affects quality of life, and can literally be life threatening.
Oral health:  Six toothbrushes per year, $25.  Six tubes of toothpaste per year, $25.  Four 50 yard boxes of dental floss per year, $20.  For a professional to monitor your oral health, coach you in areas indicated and polish your teeth too if you are a smoker or heavy coffee drinker, a dental check up with x-rays is about $210.  If you are high-risk for oral disease (smokers and sugar addicts) a second check up each year without X-rays is about $160.  Grand total, $440 if you are the high-risk patient.  That is less than you'll pay for the insurance/benefit policy.

Dental disease on the other hand is very expensive.  One small cavity will nearly double your annual dental professional cost.  Dental disease can easily cost a person $100,000 over her/his adult years if the disease, "caries," is not controlled.
What can you do?

1. Be an effective tooth brusher.  Have you learned from your dental professional how to measure your own effectiveness brushing your own teeth?  Most people spend too much time and are not effective.  Be able to check how well you have cleaned your teeth any day.  You can check our website.http://www.thisismytownusa.com/winning-with-smiles.php#contact_us

2. Be a Flosser.  The toothbrush cannot clean between your teeth and under bridges.  Most people don't floss and over 70% of all dental treatment is due to problems between the teeth.  100% of your gum disease problems will start between your teeth.
3. Get the sugar out.  In the last 40 years the average American's consumption of sugar has increased by 7 times.  Eat wisely!

4. Control the snack frequency.  If the teeth have long rest periods between meals, they can re-mineralize (heal) themselves.  Today's habits of sipping, sucking on hard candies, chewing sweet gums or popping those little mints is ruining teeth faster than anything in history.  If you chew gum or pop mints, choose ones sweetened with 100% xylitol, a long proven inhibitor of cavity formation.

Beverage sippers.  Beverages have so many problems for your health, I have an entire essay on my website devoted to them.  Just choose water.

Need more information, click HERE for Winning with Smiles.com

Contagious Cavities?

Contagious cavities

Mom’s oral health foretells her children's oral health!

Most people recognize that cavity problems seem to run in families. Most people also shrug and say "I have soft teeth, it runs in the family," as if they cannot do anything about it. That is wrong. Research has never demonstrated soft teeth. Research has definitely demonstrated the bacteria that cause cavities are contagious and we usually get ours from our caretakers when we are infants and first growing teeth.

If a family has aggressive cavity causing bacteria, they are typically traded to the infant at those cuddly slobbery and spoon sharing times. But, please do not stop being cuddling nurturing parents. There is another way! The contagious disease is dose dependent. Research has shown that cleaning up mom and dad's oral health before baby is born, or at least before infant teeth show up, is an excellent way to reduce bacterial count and improve outcomes for baby. By the way, this includes improving odds for full-term pregnancy.

A good way to start would be a dental checkup. However, by "cleaning up oral health" I don't mean necessarily getting those expensive cavities filled, though that obviously helps too. Immediate and inexpensive, or even free things people can do are:

1. Become a truly effective tooth brusher. Use disclosing tools (tablets, solutions, or kitchen food color) to show you the bacteria. Then teach yourself how to thoroughly clean your teeth. Check yourself every couple weeks until you are confident you have figured it out. Most people find they can thoroughly clean their teeth in about half the time they used to.

2. Become a flosser. Between teeth is a place the toothbrush cannot reach. Getting the bacteria out each day will reduce the cavity causing bacteria significantly over time and improve the odds for your baby.

3. If you are a gum chewer or mint popper, choose gum and mints with Xylitol as the first ingredient and preferably the only sweetener. Xylitol inhibits the acid producing capacity of cavity causing bacteria. That helps you. By doing this it also reduces survival of these bacteria, leading to fewer of these type bacteria in your saliva. That helps your baby!

4. Stop sipping sodas and sweetened beverages between meals. Even the diet drinks which don't have sugar to feed bacteria do have high acid levels and cavity causing bacteria thrive in an acid environment.

5. Don't rinse the toothpaste off after you brush. Just spit. Giving the fluoride in that residual toothpaste taste more time will make stronger enamel faster. If you have unfilled cavities it will also be more effective in those holes resisting the growth of the cavities.

Caretakers with clean mouths and good oral health practices pass on fewer detrimental bacteria to their babies. If you are not taking care of your baby during the day, who is? Has your child's caretaker had a good dental checkup lately? What are your child's caretaker’s oral health habits?

Good oral health for your baby begins long before your baby has teeth. When your baby does have teeth, be sure to create a good relationship with a dental professional before cavities have a chance to begin. The first tooth deserves a dental home.

Need more inforamtion about dental health, click HERE for Winning With Smiles.com

Plaque-The Weak Link

Plaque-The Weak Link

If we are going to stop dental disease, let's target the weak link. We need four ingredients to create a cavity. A tooth, some bacteria (plaque), food for the bacteria, and time for the bacteria to make the hole.

So, eliminating the tooth would be an undesirable way to prevent cavities. Food is essential to life, although we have a lot to do in bringing the American diet back to healthful. We obviously are not going to eliminate simple carbohydrate from our diet. The only way I know to eliminate time from the equation is also an undesirable option. That leaves the bacteria as the easiest ingredient to target.

Plaque research has identified and described this incredibly complex organization of 600+ different kinds of bacteria called plaque. With over 600 different bacteria, it is impossible to create a vaccine or anti-biotic that can wipe it out. Because of the defense mechanisms developed by this complex organization of bacteria, it is also impossible to create vaccines or antibiotics that will target specific groups of bacteria within the plaque. However, the very complexity of the plaque becomes its weakness when we are preventing cavities. We merely need to disturb the organization, the village as it were, and it has to rebuild and reorganize before it can concentrate acid to dissolve holes in our teeth. Cleaning teeth does not remove bacteria from the mouth, it gets the plaque off the teeth and this disorganizes it.

It then takes plaque a minimum of 24 hours to reorganize and begin concentrating acid again. Your teeth are "safe" for 24 hours. Think of your job as scrambling the bacteria off your teeth. You don't need a new section of floss between each tooth because you are just scrambling it off your teeth.

All you need is a way to "see" the plaque so you can teach yourself a fast and efficient way to clean your teeth daily. See our website or blog about disclosing bacteria. Thoroughly effective tooth and gums cleaning can be as little as 2 min. each day. One good effective tooth cleaning each day will protect you for 24 hours.

Want to learn more, click HERE for Winning with Smiles.com

The Cavity

The Cavity

What is it? - How does it happen?

A cavity, very simply is a hole. The body "cavity" of the Thanksgiving turkey is what you fill with stuffing. A cavity in a tooth is a hole. It is made by the bacteria of the contagious disease "caries."
In order to have a dental cavity we need four ingredients. A tooth, the right bacteria, food for the bacteria (simple carbohydrate) and some time for the bacteria to make the hole. The variety of bacteria responsible for caries thrive on simple carbohydrate (sugars and cooked starches) and grow to form a complex biofilm of 600+ different species of bacteria. This takes time, 24 hours. (Note: If you clean those bacteria off your teeth, your teeth are safe for 24 hours) That biofilm then generates acids that can dissolve calcium out of the teeth, weakening the tooth structure and eventually making the hole. This takes time too, months.

During this process the affected area slowly turns chalky white as the enamel softens. As the white lesion progresses, it gets porous enough that stain from food or bacteria begins to penetrate and the white lesion darkens to brown.

Finally, the structure gets soft enough that pieces chip out and parts dissolve away leaving the hole. Note also, before the enamel collapses the bacteria and acids have penetrated to the softer inner portion of the tooth where the cavity grows faster. When the enamel finally collapses, we find the cavity inside the tooth is much larger than the hole in the enamel. Picture if you will an inverted mushroom with the narrow stem as the hole in the enamel and the large cap of the mushroom is the larger hole inside the tooth.

Cavities take time to develop though the collapse of the enamel may seem like an overnight event. Important; in the early stages of the disease, when calcium is being lost, but the integrity of the enamel still exists, the decay process can be stopped and even reversed. We would love to show you how. Also remember, cavities start on the outside of your teeth. Cleaning a cavity and filling it can stop the cavity from creating an abscess. However, filling the cavity does nothing to stop the disease from creating another cavity in a new place. Stopping the disease can only be done by you at home. And filling the cavity will never restore the lost integrity and strength of the tooth.

Lets prevent holes in your teeth

Need more information on how to protect your teeth, click HERE for Winningwithsmiles.com

Your Smile: Healthy and Beautiful!

Your Smile

Healthy and Beautiful

Take the time to look at what shows in a smile. Look at your own. Look when it is a big smile and when it is a quiet private smile. Look at photographs you like. There is a huge variety of smiles and everyone's is unique. They typically include the teeth and some gums and lips.

My experience is most people brush their back teeth better than front teeth. Seems surprising, right? It turns out the wrist and arm coordination is much more difficult for front teeth. It is also easier for lips to interfere with toothbrushes than for cheeks to interfere. That means that typically the tooth brush does not reach the gum line of the front teeth. The result is that more yellow and brown stain develops on front teeth, more gums are red, swollen and bleeding (yuck) around front teeth, and more tartar buildup occurs on front teeth. This is not good for your smile. 
Properly cleaning and flossing your front teeth will give you whiter teeth, tight pink (not red) healthy gums, no more bleeding, and the important gum shape that displays the beautiful contours of healthy teeth.

Take a look!

Want to see more information, Click,  HERE for Winning withSmiles.com

Scott Thompson, DDS
Winning With Smiles – Pediatric Dentistry

Sugar: The Bitter Truth

Sugar: The Bitter Truth

How much .. Where is it?

I am a dentist, and I keep telling my patients, their families and my friends.  "Sugar, it is not just about the cavities."  Cavities are just the beginning of the damage to your body.  Of far greater importance is the damage it causes to your metabolic systems in your body.

It is toxic.  Recently, Dr Gupta aired an expose on "60 minutes."  Your web search engine will find it, so look at it.  Far more convincing will be to go to u-tube and watch the 90 minute lecture given by Dr Robert Lustig from University of California San Francisco entitled "Sugar: the Bitter Truth."  All calories are not the same!  Excess sugar is more harmful to you than excess fat!  Look at these videos and see for yourself.

Sugar is addictive.  Yes, just like cocaine, sugar stimulates the area of the brain that tells you "I like this."  It drives you to seek more.  As you eat more, it develops tolerance (just like it does for cocaine) so as satisfaction decreases it drives you to consume more to achieve the same level of satisfaction.  Just like cocaine and methamphetamine!  The result?  You eat more and more sugar, gain more and more weight, suffer more and more heart disease and diabetes, and more recent research is indicating higher cancer rates!

And sugar destroys.  You all know it is a key factor in the destruction of teeth.  MORE IMPORTANT it destroys livers.  Specifically fructose (half of your normal table sugar and corn syrup) metabolism in the liver not only creates by products that cause harm in organ systems in your body, it also causes fatty liver degeneration.  When your liver fails your whole body will fail.

So where is the sugar in your diet?  I was in high school, college and dental school through the 1960s.  The average American ate 30 grams of sugar each day.  The average American today is eating 200 grams of sugar!  How could that be?  It has been a slow insidious process over a couple generations.  When I was in college, a cup of coffee, teaspoon of sugar and a donut would have netted a total of 150 calories.  In today's culture, 2 generations later, a small coffee mocha and a scone at Starbucks will net you 650 calories.  In the 1960s a great dessert at a restaurant was homemade apple pie, 420 calories of decadence, ha ha. Today a single slice of raspberry cheesecake at the Cheesecake Factory will net you 1530 calories.  In the 1950s & 1960s I had a soda or other sweet beverage about twice a month.It was 7 or 8 ounces with about 20 grams of sugar.  Today, take the lowest calorie beverage sold in the stores, Vitamin Water, in what is considered a small to medium bottle, 20oz, and it has 33 grams of sugar in the one bottle.  That is more sugar than the average American ate in an entire day in the 1960s!  The average person is drinking 2 or 3 beverages a day!!  My bowl of breakfast cereal in the 1950s had one teaspoon of sugar  sprinkled on it (my mother allowed that).  There were no presweetened cereals.  Today the cereals marketed for kids have 3 times that in a bowl.  Your Catsup has 22% sugar in it (to appeal to that pleasure center in the brain).  Sugars are added to most processed foods at a level that does not necessarily taste sweet like a desert, but is enough to enhance the flavor and stimulate that addiction receptor in the brain.  It makes you want more.

This is not going to be easy.  If you are going to improve your health, it will take some attention to eating more real food.  Vegetables, Fruits, Meat, Grains, & Dairy.  Packages, boxes and bags contain processed food with additives, not real food.

Did you know the life insurance companies (the experts on predicting life span) predict for the first time in known history that today's young generation will live a shorter life span than their parents.  That doesn't bother me.  Living as an older person with the debilitating, life limiting and painful chronic diseases of heart disease, diabetes, obesity and cancer would REALLY bother me.

 Want to learn more, click HERE for Winning With Smiles.com

Scott Thompson, DDS

Pediatric Dentistry

Meadow Vista, California

Photo credit: wikipedia commons

Sugar, It's More Than Cavities

Sugar
It’s more than Cavities

Good research is finally clarifying what has been known a long time.  For lack of full understanding of the metabolic processes, this has been a hard subject to broach and expect anybody to make a serious change in their life.  After all, we all love our sweets!

In the 1970’s books like “Sugar Blues” told us that sugar was the culprit in our dietary errors, not fat.  Though excess fat in the diet is likely not healthy, it is not nearly the culprit that sugar is.  After all, Eskimo and Northern American Indians lived on fat a large portion of the year.  Yet, they did not suffer heart disease or diabetes.  After the introduction of refined carbohydrate to their diet by Europeans, things began to change.  Eskimos and Native Americans now have the highest diabetes, cardiovascular disease, dental caries, and obesity rates in the world.  Dietary fat is not the issue.  It is refined carbohydrate; sugar.

I enjoyed a recent discussion between 3 pediatricians who specialize in metabolic disease and research.  They discussed how sugar is truly addictive, just like illicit drugs.  Is it any wonder it is so hard for us to reduce sugar in our diet?  Is it any wonder food processors have added sugar to nearly all our packaged and processed foods to improve our appreciation of their flavor.  Catsup is nearly 40% sugar!  Just read the labels, sugar is everywhere.

Approximately 50% of the sugar we eat is Fructose.  No system in the body uses Fructose.  It is up to the liver to detoxify the Fructose in our body and change it into something useful.  At 50 grams Fructose per day the liver begins to fail.  Yes, fail.  The average American who ate 15 grams of Fructose in the 1960’s is now eating 100 grams of Fructose daily.  And yes, livers are failing.  There are numerous cases of teenagers with total liver failure and needing liver transplants.

It is time to look at what we are eating.  Read labels.  Vitamin Water (What a misnomer!) is the lowest calorie beverage you can buy in the store today; only 50 calories per 8 oz.  That translates, in grams, to a full 20 oz bottle (small in today’s standards) having 33 grams of sugar.  That is more than the average American ate in an entire day in the 1960’s.

Keep your eyes on the health literature; this is a growing hot topic as degenerative disease claims more of our friends at younger ages.  Keep your eyes on the labels of packaged foods and be surprised!  Consider doing more “cooking” of real food from the vegetable, dairy and meat perimeter walls in your supermarket.  Real food.  Fresh food.

Want to learn more, click HERE to visit Winning With Smiles.com

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How Often to Brush and Floss?

How Often to Brush and Floss?

If a person is cleaning their teeth effectively (see "Finding Hidden  Bacteria in Your Mouth" and "Why Are You Flossing?") then the teeth and gums are safe until the bacteria return, organize their bio-environment and begin causing damage.

Studies indicate it takes 24 hours or a little longer depending on mouth chemistry and diet.

So effectively cleaned teeth are safe for one full day. Most people will brush more than once per day because they are concerned about food particles showing in their smile and about food particles on teeth creating bad breath.

So most people will brush a couple times daily after meals. For "healthy" teeth, however, one "effective tooth cleaning" each day is enough for excellent oral health.

Scott Thompson,DDS

530-878-2357

Why Are You Flossing?

Why Are You Flossing?

The answer is kind of simple. For age 3 and older, 95% of the fillings I do are because of cavities between teeth.

Why? Because the bacteria hide between the teeth where the toothbrush cannot get them and they make their holes in the teeth there.

Most people don’t floss so I have cavities to fill. If people would listen and do, I could make my living doing teaching and check-ups for patients rather than fillings.

For adults, my periodontist friends who take care of all the gum problems tell me 100% of the periodontitis (gum problems) begins between teeth.

So… Are you flossing daily?

Scott Thompson, DDS

530-878-2357

Photo credit: wikipedia commons

How Long Should You Brush?

How Long to Brush?

Brush until they are clean. Most people try to brush for 2 minutes twice a day. Time is not the answer.

People who have taught themselves to be effective tooth brushers can get the job done in one minute. If you are brushing the way you have always brushed since a child, some places get clean and some don’t.

More times per day and more minutes per brushing just gets the clean spots cleaner and the not clean spots are still not clean!

Teach yourself to be an effective brusher (see "disclosing bacteria) and get the job done in one minute per day! Be sure to ask us to evaluate your effectiveness when you are in the office.

Scott Thompson, DDS

530-878-2357

What is a Cavity?

A cavity is a hole in the tooth. It is the end result of a contagious disease caused by bacteria. If these bacteria are allowed to live on the teeth (inadequate brushing and flossing) and we feed these bacteria sugars (juice, sodas, sweet teas, sweet coffees, pastries, candies, etc.) the acids they "poop" from their metabolism will dissolve holes in the teeth.

A filling or crown cleans the hole and fills it to support the damaged tooth, but DOES NOTHING TO STOP THE DISEASE.

If home care and diet is not resisting and removing the bacteria, the disease continues and new holes develop. They destroy that expensive dental work, make holes in new areas, and eventually destroy the teeth.

Learn how to "see" those bacteria and teach yourself to be an effective tooth brusher (see "Finding Hidden  Bacteria in Your Mouth" in these note files).

Scott Thompson,DDS

530-878-2357

Finding Hidden Bacteria in Your Mouth

Disclosing Bacteria

The bacteria that “hide” on our teeth and dissolve holes in them (cavities) are the same color as our teeth.  Like the grasshopper hiding in the grass from the bird is green and hard to find.  To find them we have in the office “disclosing solution” which colors the bacteria red and makes them easy to see.

If you can see the bacteria, it is easy to teach yourself  how to be an effective tooth brusher. 

If you “know your enemy” you will find getting teeth clean takes less time than most people normally use for brushing.

AT HOME you can use the vegetable food coloring you have in your kitchen cabinet.  The same stuff you use to color Easter Eggs and make blue cake with green frosting (yikes!). 

After you have done a normal brushing, just put 2 drops on your tongue and lick it all over your teeth.  Rinse real well with some water and then look.  The bacteria will be colored.  You will see the places your “normal brushing” is good and the places you are missing.

 Now teach yourself how to get all those places clean.  Someone who knows how to get her/his teeth clean will be able to do an excellent brushing in one minute.  WOW!

The benefits of excellent brushing are:
1) Whiter teeth!
2) No more bleeding gums!
3) Stop cavities.
4) What a smile!!

Scott Thompson, DDS
530-878-2357