Kissing a baby on the lips may look cute but at the same time it exposes an infant to baby bottle tooth decay, as the decay of children teeth is commonly known as, is a serious oral health problem. Nearly 50 percent of the child population in the age group 2-5 years suffers from the disease, said experts here.
“It manifests as destruction of primary or milk teeth within months of their eruption. The dental caries in children teeth spreads rapidly and by the time it comes to the notice of the parents, almost whole of the coronal structure (crown portion of the tooth) is already lost. These broken down primary teeth can cause pain to the child,” said Dr Ashima Goyal Professor, Department of Oral Health Sciences.
Goyal further added that sometimes the child is not able to express besides difficulty in chewing food and problems with speech. The child and the parents also get worried about the facial appearance of the child, which is affected by the broken down front teeth. These factors can interfere in the personality development and behaviour of the child.
‘Early Childhood Caries’ in very young are often related to night-time feeding (breast or baby bottle), delayed and poor oral hygiene habits and the frequent consumption of caries producing sweetened food stuffs after weaning.
A prospective research project on 16-18 months old children of Chandigarh carried out by Paediatric Unit of Oral Health Sciences Centre of PGI has shown that besides consumption of sugary foods and night time bottle feeding,
certain behavioural and social factors like sharing of utensils with the child, working status of the mother and low birth weight babies with improper development of teeth (hypoplastic lesions) also have strong bearing on the development of cavities in children.
According to the leading dental experts a little effort on the part of parents with basic home care measures can prevent this condition from occurring which includes start of tooth-brushing as soon as the first tooth erupts, use of a speck of fluoride toothpaste on tooth brush after 2 years of age, night time brushing and tongue cleaning with brush assisted by the parents, decrease in frequent snacking especially those containing sugar.
Common oral health problems in adults include dental caries and gum diseases, which can be prevented by regular removal of dental plaque, a sticky layer of micro-organism on the teeth, by brushing after every meal with a fluoride toothpaste, regular use of Inter-dental brush and floss apart from restricting intake of anything sweet to not more than three times a day.