Parents should detect their children's tooth decay as early as possible

As the saying goes, "ten people have nine caries", what makes tooth decay rampant? Why are children at high risk? Experts point out that the main culprit of tooth decay in children is some details of life that are unique to children.

The main culprit of tooth decay in children

Most children do not pay much attention to oral hygiene, especially children's foods, which are often high in sugar.

Most children with tooth decay have unhygienic oral hygiene, children like to eat sugary foods, if too much intake of high sugar content, its residues are easy to remain in the mouth, these residues react with saliva to form acidic substances, which will directly destroy the tooth structure.Nowadays, the food is highly refined and most foods contain sugar, children especially like to eat snacks, and most children do not have the habit of rinsing their mouths immediately.

In this way, after a period of time, tooth decay also appears, and the child's poor life details cause tooth decay.

In addition, it takes a period of time for children to have obvious symptoms of tooth decay, so it is not easy for parents to find, after tooth decay, baby teeth generally need to take 1 year to appear, and permanent teeth need 1-2 years to find, tooth decay is not easy to find in the incubation period, and some children do not like to pay attention to living habits and hygiene habits, which also aggravates the appearance of tooth decay.

Early symptoms of tooth decay

Caries prone site

The site of caries is closely related to whether food is easily retained. Some places on the surface of the teeth that are not easy to be cleaned, and bacteria and food debris are easy to be retained, there is more plaque accumulation, which is easy to lead to the occurrence of caries, and these parts are the most common parts of caries, including: pits and fissures, adjacent surfaces and tooth necks.

The pit and fissure of the tooth is a defect left over from the process of tooth development and mineralization, and it is also the primary site of caries, and the adjacent surface of the tooth is the most common site of caries after the pit and fissure, which is generally caused by food impaction caused by the wear of the adjacent contact surface or the atrophy of the papilla between the teeth.The neck of the tooth is the junction between enamel and dentin, which is conducive to the retention of food and bacteria, and is also a weak link in the tooth tissue, especially if the enamel is not in contact with the cementum, and the dentin is more likely to decay when it is directly exposed.

Caries prone teeth

Due to the characteristics of different tooth anatomical morphologies and growth sites, the incidence of caries varies among teeth. A large number of epidemiological survey data showed that the distribution of dental positions in caries was basically symmetrical on the left and right sides, with more lower jaw than maxillary, more posterior teeth than anterior teeth, and the lowest caries rate in mandibular anterior teeth.

Degree of decay

With the development of the course of the disease, the lesion enters the dentin from the glaze, and the tissue is constantly destroyed and disintegrated and gradually forms a cavity, which is often divided into three stages of shallow, medium and deep caries according to the degree of caries.

Superficial caries: Also known as enamel caries, caries is confined to enamel. At the beginning, it appears as chalky patches caused by demineralization on the smooth surface, and later it is yellowish-brown due to coloration, and the pits and fissures are ink-soaked and diffused, generally without obvious caries cavities, only rough feeling during exploration, and shallow holes confined to enamel may appear in the later stage, without conscious symptoms, and there is no response to exploration.

Medium caries: caries has reached the superficial layer of dentin, there are obvious cavities in clinical examination, there can be pain detection, pain response to external stimuli (such as cold, heat, sweet, sour and food embedding, etc.), when the stimulus is removed, the pain disappears immediately, and there is no spontaneous pain.

Deep caries: caries has reached the deep dentin layer, generally manifested as large and deep cavities, or the entrance is small and deep with extensive destruction, the response to external stimuli is heavier than that of medium caries, but after the stimulus source is removed, it can still immediately relieve pain, no spontaneous pain.

Caries appears as a black transmission area on x-rays, which can be diagnosed with the help of x-rays in patients who are difficult to diagnose (eg, proximal caries).

The type of lesion that is decayed

(1) Chronic caries

Caries generally progresses slowly, especially in adults, and is mostly chronic, with a longer course of disease, a drier texture and less soft caries, and such patients have a longer restoration process, usually with a hardened dentin layer at the bottom of the cave.

(2) Acute caries

It is more common in children, adolescents, pregnant women or people in poor health, the course of treatment is short and the progression is rapid, there are more soft caries, the texture is soft, the coloration is also light, it is light yellow or chalky, it is easy to be dug out, and the bottom of the cave lacks a hardened dentin layer.

(3) Resting caries

As local cariogenic factors are eliminated, the progression of caries is very slow or completely stopped, which is called quiescent caries.

(4) Secondary caries

It is more common in the process of caries treatment when the decayed tissue is not cleaned or the edges of the restoration are not sealed, forming a fissure and causing caries to occur again.