Healthy Teeth At Halloween!

If you are taking your children ‘trick or treating’ in the Burton and Ashby area, please read on.

Although more widely popular in the US, there is little doubt that Halloween is increasingly popular with children in the UK too. Many parents will be taking their children ‘trick or treating’ in their local areas and subsequently having to deal with the large bags of ‘sugary goodness’ that their children return home with.

In today’s Alexandra Dental Care blog, our children’s dentists discuss ways that you can help your children avoid the worst consequences of Halloween.

Accept but stay in control

Unless you are very fortunate, you are unlikely to convince your child to avoid eating the sweets altogether. This does not mean that you shouldn’t exercise a level of control over which sweets they eat and when they eat them.

Although all sweets will contain high levels of sugar, those that are quickly chewed, then swallowed, are generally less damaging to the teeth than those which are chewed for a long time or sucked. The longer a sweet is in the mouth, the longer the sugar comes into contact with the teeth. We recommend that you try to keep the latter type of sweet to a minimum.

Try to agree times when the children are allowed sweets and stick to these times. It is important that lengthy periods of time are allowed between eating sweets so that the saliva can wash away much of the sugar from the mouth. Kids usually like chewing gum, and this can be an excellent alternative in periods between eating sweets. Not only will using a sugar free gum (don’t use regular gum) help to remove debris and bacteria, but also increases saliva flow which helps to wash the sugars away.

Supervise

However well you manage to restrict children’s sugar intake at Halloween, it is still likely that they will consume enough to promote problems such as tooth decay. As such we recommend that additional parental supervision is provided whilst your children clean their teeth.

Make sure that they spend at least two minutes cleaning their teeth (this does not include the ‘talking with a toothbrush in the mouth’ time!) If they are old enough, this is also an excellent time to introduce dental floss as this will also help to remove small pieces of left-over sweets that would otherwise be stuck between the teeth all night. Once introduced, try to keep this as a regular oral health habit as it really can help to prevent decay and gum disease.

Equally important, of course, is ongoing professional dental care for both children and adults. At Alexandra Dental Care, as well as offering cosmetic dentistry, we pride ourselves on providing a high quality preventative care service for patients of all ages. If you live in Burton or Ashby and would like to make an appointment for any member of your family, please call us on 01283 216347.

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