When Dental Problems Aren’t Dental

At her consultation, we started off with Becky’s medical history and a thorough exam of her mouth -especially the failing restorations. Before long, I realized that Becky’s dental problems were being caused by her dry mouth. She was shocked! “Can dry mouth cause cavities like this!?!” she asked. After more investigation, we knew the dry mough was caused by her medications.

When Dental Solutions Aren’t Dental

Sometimes the first step in fixing a dental problem is not dental treatment. For Becky, step one in permanently fixing her teeth was medical, not dental. Why? Because the answer to the question “Can dry mouth cause cavities?” is a definite “YES!” We needed to deal with her root problem, dry mouth, before dealing with the cavities. Otherwise, the cavities would just keep coming.

First things FIRST!

We started her treatment by talking to her physician. We needed to know if he could treat her medical conditions with medications that don’t cause dry mouth? If the dry mouth can be fixed, then we could simply fix her teeth and be done. If the dry mouth could NOT be stopped, then she would need a more complicated solution.

Find a Good Long Term Solution

In Becky’s case, her physician said that her medications could not be changed. That meant that her only long term solution was going to be full mouth dental implants. Dental implants are the only teeth that can survive dry mouth because they can’t decay.

Had we gone ahead and jumped right in replacing fillings and crowns, she would have been back on my doorstep in a matter of months having to do it again.

When a filling falls out or a crown falls off, ALWAYS find out WHY before investing in any repairs!

Beware of Filling Killing Candy!!!

Of course candy is bad for teeth, but did you know that some kinds of candy are extra bad? Imagine if your crown fell out because of the candy you were chewing! Surprisingly, some candies are so effective at pulling out fillings and crowns that dentists use them for crown removal during treatment. In fact, occasionally we get calls from patients who have pulled out a whole eating a sticky gummy candy. If you want to keep your teeth in your mouth and your fillings in your teeth, avoid sticky gummy candies! Read more here

Also, we already talked about sugary drinks earlier on this page, but they cause enough problems that they should be mentioned again. In general, sugary drinks include things like sodas, energy drinks, sweet tea, juice, sweetened coffee, and even organic smoothies. Basically, these drinks cause cavities around fillings and crowns because they keep the teeth constantly bathed in sugar when people sip them. For example, we’ve seen patients develop huge cavities in only six months after adding extra sugar to their coffee every morning. The sweet liquid finds the smallest cracks and fills them with sugar. To conclude, sugary drinks are powerful cavity creators.