Smoking Reduces Healthy Bacteria & Increases Dental Diseases

Here's yet another reason not to smoke...

We all have large amounts of bacteria in our saliva, most of them good and helpful.  They help to begin the digestion of our food.  Some are helpful in warding off infection by viruses and other bacteria.  Others are not so desirable, like the ones that produce cavities and gum disease.

Studies demonstrate that smokers have fewer of the helpful bacteria, allowing the damaging bacteria to grow in larger numbers.  This increases the disease potential in the mouths of smokers.

Also remember, second hand smoke is just as bad as primary smoking.  Don’t smoke indoors where other non-smokers (like your children) will be forced to breath the second hand smoke.

Cigarettes by Anna Langova

How Long should you brush your teeth?

How Long Should You 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. Call us at 1-530-878-2357 or visit our web page. www.winningwithsmiles.com


Scott Thompson, DDS

Sports Drinks and Energy Drinks: Not for Kids

The American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Nutrition and Council on Sports Medicine and Fitness published their “Clinical Report – Sports Drinks and Energy Drinks for Children and Adolescents: Are They Appropriate?” 

In today’s blog I am going to merely quote summary statements from that report.  The full text is available free on line and I encourage you to use the reference at the end to access, print and read the full text.  The details and references are stunning.

“Sports drinks and energy drinks are significantly different products, and the terms should not be used interchangeably.”

“Rigorous review and analysis of the literature reveal that caffeine and other stimulant substances contained in energy drinks have no place in the diet of children and adolescents. Furthermore, frequent or excessive intake of caloric sports drinks can substantially increase the risk for overweight or obesity in children and adolescents.”

“With children and adolescents, careful consideration is necessary when selecting a beverage to hydrate before, during, or after exercise and outside of physical activity to prevent excessive sugar and caloric intake that may encourage dental erosion, overweight, and obesity.”

“Children and adolescents should be taught to drink water routinely as an initial beverage of choice as long as daily dietary caloric and other nutrient (e.g., calcium, vitamins) needs are being met. Water is also generally the appropriate first choice for hydration before, during, and after most exercise regimens. Children should have free access to water, particularly during school hours.”

“Sports and energy drinks are not indicated for use during meals or snacks as a replacement for low-fat milk or water.”

“The actual caffeine content for many energy drinks is not easily identified on product packaging or via the Internet. The total amount of caffeine contained in some cans or bottles of energy drinks can exceed 500 mg (equivalent to 14 cans of common caffeinated soft drinks) and is clearly high enough to result in caffeine toxicity. …

Additional concerns regarding the use of caffeine in children include its effects on the developing neurologic and cardiovascular systems and the risk of physical dependence and addiction.  Because of the potentially harmful adverse effects and developmental effects of caffeine, dietary intake should be discouraged for all children.”

“For most children and adolescents, daily electrolyte requirements are met sufficiently by a healthy balanced diet; therefore, sports drinks offer little to no advantage over plain water. During or after participation in short training or competition sessions, athletes generally do not need supplemental electrolyte replacement.”

“Low-fat milk is a good option for use as a post-exercise protein-recovery drink.”

“In general, the use of amino acids in energy drinks in place of traditional dietary sources is not supported by the scientific literature and, therefore, is discouraged for children and adolescents.”

“Given the current epidemic of childhood overweight and obesity, we recommend the elimination of calorie containing beverages from a well-balanced diet, with the exception of low-fat or fat-free milk, because it contains calcium and vitamin D, which are particularly important for young people.”

Want to learn more, check out this link to read the full report:http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2011/05/25/peds.2011-0965

Call us to find out more: 530-878-2358

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

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

It is Not Just About Cavities

Oral Health.  It is not just about cavities.  Here are two significant briefs from the literature highlighting that oral health has wide reaching implications for your total health.

  
Risk for Two Birth Defects Affected by Overall Quality of Pregnant Woman's Diet.  Medical News Today – October 4. The overall quality of a pregnant woman's diet is linked with risk for 2 types of serious birth defects, according to a new study in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.

In the study, women who ate better before and during pregnancy gave birth to fewer infants with malformations of the brain and spinal cord, or orofacial clefts, such as cleft lip and cleft palate. “Our study showed for the first time that the overall quality of the diet, and not just a single nutrient matters in terms of reducing the risk of birth defects," say researchers. The study is also the first to connect diet quality with reduced risk for cleft lip or cleft palate. 

Oral Health of Diabetes Patients Closely Linked to Heart Disease and Cancer Risk.  Medical News Today – October 3.  A new report in the British Dental Journal reveals that many individuals who suffer with diabetes are not aware that their oral health is closely connected to their risk of developing complications. According to the authors, inflammation from gums that are swollen can increase the severity of diabetes, increase deaths from oral cancer, and make cardiovascular disease worse. In addition, diabetes that is longstanding and poorly controlled seems to speed up the development of gum disease. However, a survey of 229 adults visiting a diabetes clinic discovered that the majority were unaware of any connection between dental health and their condition. Only 13% of participants were aware that swollen or tender gums could be affected by the disease, and only 12% knew there might be a connection between the disease and loose teeth.

Good oral health habits as well as good eating habits are just the beginning of living healthy productive lives.  What you put in your mouth and how you care for your teeth will have a definite impact on the quality of your life forever.  It is not just about cavities.
http://www.thisismytownusa.com/winning-with-smiles.php
To learn more, contact WinningWithSmiles.com or call 530-878-2357

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.