You have surely looked at some point for a guide on how to stop your child from getting decayed teeth. Surprisingly often in the practice I come across mothers who do not have the information they need on how to prevent tooth decay, and very often not even an awareness of how tooth decay develops in the first place.
It all begins and ends with proper dental hygiene. Because only clean teeth stay free of decay.
How tooth decay develops
To begin with, we have to say that tooth decay — just like flu or tonsillitis, for example — is classed as an infectious disease. Bacteria and several other factors that help them are therefore involved in its development. This means above all sugars. It is important to point out that the key to the development of tooth decay is not the amount of sugars, but above all the frequency with which they are consumed. If sugars are taken in once a day, it is not as much of a problem as when sugars are taken in repeatedly throughout the day.
Everyone will of course immediately think of the sugars found in chocolate, sweets in general or cola drinks. But they are also in medicines (syrups for fever, pain, allergies and the like).
Why sugars are harmful
Why are sugars actually so harmful? Sugars are fuel for bacteria. As they process them, the bacteria produce acids that damage the surface of the tooth. With prolonged exposure they weaken the tooth so much that tooth decay develops.
The sugars that fuel bacteria also include lactose — the milk sugar found in breast milk, which can be harmful above all at night. Breast milk of course contains plenty of beneficial substances, and this article is in no way campaigning against night-time breastfeeding. However, for your child to avoid problems with tooth decay, a few measures need to be taken.
Hygiene from the first tooth
As soon as your child’s first tooth comes through, start with dental hygiene. At first a damp gauze, a towel, a flannel or a cloth handkerchief will do. Use these after every feed (around 10 minutes afterwards) to wipe each tooth separately and so wipe away the plaque containing sugars. This is important above all with night-time breastfeeding, when the child’s saliva production stops and so the teeth are not cleaned naturally. A so-called finger brush can also help — a silicone brush that slips over the finger and makes a few seconds of cleaning the teeth child’s play.
Many of you mothers will object that surely, once the child has fallen asleep, you are not going to wake them by cleaning. Please, try to imagine your child crying because of the toothache that goes with advanced tooth decay, when often nothing can be done because they are too young for trauma-free treatment. Is that a more pleasant cry than the one when the child happens to wake up while you are trying to prevent these problems by cleaning? Mothers, your child’s health is in your hands.
Watch out for the baby bottle
If you feed your child from a bottle instead of breastfeeding at night, you also need to be on your guard. Not only infant formula, but also sweetened tea or juice have the same effect on the teeth as chocolate. That is why it is necessary to switch to unsweetened tea or plain water. In the case of infant formula, the teeth again need to be cleaned during the night.
Other factors
Other factors in the development of tooth decay in a small child are poor eating habits and poor dental hygiene within the family. If the mother (but also the father or siblings) does not have a healthy set of teeth free of decay or inflammation in the mouth, she is herself a source of infection for her child. During contact with the child through kisses or by sharing cutlery, the decay-causing bacteria are easily transmitted. The mother’s illness, stressful conditions and medication during pregnancy also play a role. Genetic predispositions, which are often taken as a crutch when tooth decay is discovered in a child, on the contrary contribute only minimally.