St. George Center for Specialized Dentistry
Cosmetic Dentistry
St. George, UT
(435) 674-3100
Saliva is wonderful-it has powerful chemistry that protects our bodies against viruses and our teeth against bacteria.It buffers teeth against acid that can cause cavities.It is also a lubricant that makes it easier to taste, enjoy, and swallow food.It helps us speak and gives more suction to removable dentures so they stay in place.Dry mouth conditions can cause us to loose this natural protection against cavities and can cause removable dentures to rub and be uncomfortable.
Some people can have a condition where their immune system attacks their saliva glands and they are unable to produce saliva.Some cancer patients who have radiation to the head and neck can have their saliva glands damaged.Furthermore, over 400 medications, some of them very common, have a suppressing effect on the saliva glands causing dry mouth or "Xerostomia".People that have not been prone to cavities all their life can quickly develop multiple cavities especially on the root surfaces of teeth that have become exposed with age due to gum disease.
Seniors planning on starting a new medication or having cancer radiation treatment to the head and neck area should brush and floss more diligently than ever before.Super concentrated fluoride prescription toothpastes, rinses, and gels worn in mouth guards can strengthen the teeth against cavities.Chewing of sugarless gum to stimulate saliva flow can sometimes help and avoiding frequent sugary snacks is more important than ever.
Seniors are keeping their teeth longer, but the changes that occur with time can compromise teeth.Teeth that are not properly cleaned can develop gum infections that can loosen teeth and can expose the soft tooth roots that are more prone to cavities.
Brushing and flossing routines can become less effective with age, making more frequent cleaning visits at the dental office necessary.New devises that make gripping floss and brushing easier can be recommended for use at home.Prescription strength fluorides and other products can be recommended.(Remember to just spit out after using these and resist the urge to rinse with water.)Use of some products that contain alcohol is sometimes discouraged because alcohol dries the mouth and has been linked to oral cancer.
For those with removable dentures, leaving them out at night can prevent fungal infections and keep the mouth and denture fresh.Most denture freshening tablets, although not harmful, have little real benefit and sticky adhesives are usually discouraged because, if not properly used, can cause damage.
The benefits of frequent dental visits for seniors cannot be understated.Teeth that are compromised need to be cleaned more frequently than ever before and sometimes the little pointers learned at a check up can make all the difference.
Brushing and flossing your teeth is just as important now as it was when you were a youngster. Brush your teeth twice a day with a product featuring the ADA Seal of Acceptance.Choose a toothbrush with soft bristles. If you have limited ability to move your shoulders, arms or hands, you may benefit from using an electric toothbrush. Clean between teeth daily with floss or other interdental cleaners such as picks or brushes.
Replace your toothbrush every three or four months, or sooner if the bristles becomes frayed. A worn toothbrush will not do a good job of cleaning your teeth.
Bacteria stick to your teeth and also to full or partial dentures. If you wear dentures, remember to clean them on a daily basis. Take your dentures out of your mouth for at least four hours every day. It's best to remove your full or partial dentures at night. To stay healthy, the lining of your mouth needs to rejuvenate after prolonged contact with dentures. Your dentist will provide you with instructions about how long your dentures may be worn each day. Denture cleaning products like denture cleansers and overnight soaking solutions help keep dentures fresh and clean, but manual cleaning with mild soap and a denture brush is best. Denture adhesive is not recommended, but if you use it, use only a little as it can build up and throw off the alignment of the dentures, accelerating the rate that they wear out and the rate that the jaw bones shrink with time-all of which start a cycle that leads to bad fitting dentures and poor anatomy to tolerate a good fitting denture.
Consuming optimally fluoridated water throughout life helps prevent tooth decay no matter how old you are. If you choose bottled water, check the label for fluoride content. If you have dry mouth, avoid sucking on sugary candies or sipping on beverages other than water. Talk to your dentist about what is best for you.
Smoking increases problems with gum disease, tooth decay and tooth loss. It also affects healing after dental procedures and the retention of dental implants. There are tobacco cessation programs, over-the counter products and prescription medications that your dentist may prescribe or recommend that can help you quit smoking.
Visit your dentist regularly for a complete dental check up. Your dentist can help evaluate problems that medications may create for your mouth. To get the most out of your dental visit, please bring the above items to your dental checkup.
The U.S. Surgeon General has said, “You're not healthy without good oral health.” Bad oral health can manifest itself as infections of the lips, cheeks, teeth, gums or the bone around the teeth and are caused by microorganisms. Medical research has shown that these microorganisms pass into the blood stream and are transmitted throughout the body and can manifest themselves far from the mouth causing or increasing the severity of serious life threatening health problems such as heart disease, heart infections, pneumonia, and stroke. Even if a serious health problem is not manifest, a chronic infection such as cavities or gum disease, that leaches into the blood stream is a drag on the whole body and can have a marked effect on an individual's energy level.
The U.S. Surgeon General has also said, “The mouth is the gateway to the body for good or for ill.” Many general health problems can manifest themselves first in the mouth. The Center for Disease control reported 25,000 cases of oral cancer last year. This statistic underscores the importance of visiting the dentist because early signs are not painful and can easily go unnoticed until it is too late. Dentists and patients should pay special attention to the high-risk areas-under the tongue and the sides of the tongue for red/white patches or sores that last more than 10 days. Alcohol and tobacco use exponentially increase the risk for oral cancer.
There are quite a few general health problems that can make maintaining a healthy mouth more difficult. For example, if diabetes is not controlled, mouth infections can become more severe. Also, sleep apnea and mouth breathing can cause the mouth to become excessively dry-an environment in which destructive microorganisms thrive. Sometimes overlooked are conditions that cause us to be less effective in our brushing and flossing-arthritis and other conditions that affect our independence or dexterity in holding a toothbrush.
In the past some of us may have thought oral health as being isolated from the rest of our body, but now it is clear that there are very serious links between our oral health and overall health.
Obviously everything we eat must go through our mouth where it is broken down by the teeth and lubricated with saliva before it is swallowed. People with oral problems can have less chewing efficiency that causes them to avoid the variety of foods they once enjoyed because of fear of fatigue, pain, or even choking. For example, those with conventional removable dentures to replace missing teeth have less than 20% of the chewing efficiency compared to their natural teeth, not to mention less ability to feel, taste, and enjoy food.
Fortunately, many determined people find ways to enjoy their favorite foods despite significant oral problems and malnutrition is not solely the result of a loss of chewing function if food substituting and preparation is done in educated and innovative ways. However, if unhealthy refined and processed foods are substituted because they are easier to chew (or for any reason for that matter), not only does the risk for cavities increase, but also the risk for general health problems. Substituting food rich in protein and vitamins for empty calorie foods can lead to loss of muscle mass and can compound the problem of declining vitamin absorption by the body that occurs with age resulting in increased risk of injury and disease.
One of the main benefits of a healthy mouth is the ability to chew comfortably and enjoy a greater variety of foods that can make maintaining a healthy diet, and living life in general, more pleasant and easy. Maintaining this quality of life through the restoration and replacement of teeth with implant and reconstructive dentistry is the focus of the specialty of Prosthodontics.
Many factors contribute to the loss of teeth (edentulism)-some people are born without certain teeth and some loose their teeth because of disease, injury and wear as a result of clenching or grinding. Tooth loss creates both esthetic and functional problems, resulting in unwanted changes to facial appearance, as well as a detrimental effect on chewing ability, confidence and self-esteem.
What about all the modern advances in dental care-shouldn't there be less missing teeth? Indeed, it is true that the percentage of people with missing teeth is decreasing, however; since there are more people living longer, the number of missing teeth in the population is actually increasing.
How do Americans today feel about edentulism? A 1997 survey sponsored by The American College of Prosthodontists found that 73% of Americans said they would feel self-conscious if they lost a tooth and that a healthy-looking smile ranks among the top three aspects of a person's appearance that affect self-esteem. Furthermore, 25% said that their smile or teeth is the one facial feature they would change to boost their self-esteem.
Fortunately today there are exciting new options in the specialty of prosthodontics that can restore natural beauty and function through oral reconstruction utilizing veneers, crowns, and dental implants.
A healthy jawbone supports our lips and face attractively, but when teeth are removed the bone begins to dissolve and continues gradually throughout life. This is one reason why even good dentures slowly become loose with time-the jawbone that once supported the denture shrinks, but denture stays the same shape it was before. This poor fitting denture only accelerates the process and makes the jawbone shrink faster. This cycle, especially when not corrected, can continue to the point that it is quite difficult and sometimes impossible to tolerate wearing dentures. Although relining or remaking dentures can slow this process, it can never stop it. Dental implants are the only solution that can stimulate the jawbone and stop this process. Unlike dentures, modern prosthodontics that include implants are anchored to the bone like natural teeth and do not slip so you can eat and speak comfortably and confidently.
The shape, size, and arrangement of teeth are even more important than color to avoid an artificial “off-the-shelf” look. These factors give a smile distinction that connotes an individual's sex, personality, and age, thereby dramatically enhancing self-image and quality of life.
In general, longer teeth that show are more youthful and smaller teeth with rounded corners, some overlapping, and minor tilting are more feminine. Larger teeth prominently arranged with vigorous angles and tilts are more aggressive, rugged, and masculine. With this in mind, it is evident that esthetic dentistry for seniors needs to be personalized with careful awareness and communication.
If you are thinking about improving your smile through new dentures, veneers, or crowns communicate with your dentist your desires to insure you get the appropriate custom appearance you intend. Here are some things you can do: Early in the planning process bring in photos that shows your smile when you had teeth to help you communicate past details of your smile that you wish to restore. Also, bring a trusted friend or significant other to the appointment when the prosthesis is tried in so that they can help you evaluate the esthetics from their perspective. Insist on this “try-in” appointment from your dentist so that you are allowed the opportunity to make these custom changes before finishing. It's about restoring more than just missing teeth-it's about restoring those recognizable endearing characteristics of yourself or having the look you always wanted-the choice is yours.
Whoever designed teeth must have been a genius! Each type has a unique function--front teeth are long and sharp like knifes and best used functionally for cutting and back teeth are short and squatty and best used for mashing. The back teeth are shaped this way so that they can resist compression force, which is the greatest in the back of the mouth. To see this, imagine trying to break a pencil with your teeth-you would naturally bite it with your back teeth.
Unfortunately, although resistant to compression, back teeth are weak if they are rubbed together. Luckily, the long slender front teeth are the opposite not only in shape, but in that they are strong when rubbed together, but not when compressed. The amazing part of bite design is evident when you notice that when the front teeth rub together they take the lateral pressure off the back teeth and when the back teeth clenched they take the compressive pressure off the front teeth-they “protect” each other. With this in mind, it is easy to see why people who have lost their back teeth and use their front teeth to compress food sometimes break their front teeth and those people who have back teeth and have lost their front teeth and use their back teeth to grind side-to-side with sometimes break their back teeth.
Believe it or not, our teeth are always shifting back and forth, and we adapt and never notice, but greater shifts can occur when even one or two teeth are lost and the bite can be thrown out of balance. For example, everyone knows that tires last longer when they are balanced and when the car is properly aligned. Indeed, even and appropriate distribution of forces in a person's bite is critical to oral longevity.
Stress or a tense personality type causes 80-90% of people to grind their teeth at night. Night grinding is difficult to stop and the usual treatment is to wear a plastic protective guard that can be remade inexpensively when it wears out. Daytime grinding, on the other hand, can be controlled if the person is made aware that they have a nervous habit like clenching, lip-biting, thumb-sucking, or nail-biting. Even playing certain musical instruments can cause abnormal posturing that can result in tooth wear.
Furthermore, tooth wear can become extreme when harsh conditions exist such as stomach acid reflux or bulimia, over vigorous tooth brushing, smokeless tobacco use, or breathing in dust or other gritty particles. This is especially true for teeth that are “genetically soft.”
Also, wear can be accelerated if the teeth do not fit when biting. First, all teeth should touch simultaneously. Second, back teeth can withstand great vertical forces, but not lateral forces. Front teeth are the opposite and guide the jaw so that lateral forces do not break the back teeth-the front and back teeth protect each other.
Fortunately, with careful planning, beauty and function can often be restored to teeth that have extreme wear.
In general, teeth become darker and less able to transmit light with age, but they do it both from the inside as well as the outside. On the outside, surface stains from food, beverages, and smoking that build up over time can be easily removed with dramatic whitening results by professional bleaching. On the inside, the blood vessels inside teeth that give them a youthful vitality shrink with age and are replaced with a colored material that shows through to the outside and gives the teeth a color that is far from pure white.
The change in tooth color that occurs with age is different for men and women. Recent studies have shown that, compared to senior white females, senior white males naturally have darker, more intensely colored teeth that are colored more on the red/yellow than green/yellow side of the spectrum. Usually this amount of tooth color that naturally occurs in teeth is so subtle that the average person on the street does not notice it, but tetracycline exposure early in life and certain birth defects can cause noticeable tooth pigmentation.
The amount of tooth color that is acceptable to people varies by culture and media influence. Indeed, a strait, even, white smile can look desirably youthful, but without subtle natural characterization it may also stand out as appearing noticeably artificial
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Address: 640 E 700 S #104 • St. George, UT 84770 • Phone: (435) 674-3100
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