Antibiotics: Use And Abuse

Antibiotics: Use And Abuse

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Article By Dr. Ving J. Lee | Featured on Dear Doctor

Maintaining the Right Balance in the Fight Against Disease

Imagine a world without antibiotics: The cut on your finger might lead to serious infection; the simplest operation could be a perilous undertaking; there would be no effective cures for tuberculosis, cholera, strep throat or sexually transmitted disease; and bacterial meningitis in a child would likely be fatal. It may seem hard to believe, but a century ago — before antibiotic drugs became widely available — these risks were very real.

These omnipresent drugs have been hailed as one of the most significant medical achievements of the 20th Century. However, in recent years, a disturbing trend has been noted throughout the world: The life-saving drugs we once relied on are now less effective at fighting the organisms that cause disease.

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The Bitter Truth About Sugar

The Bitter Truth About Sugar

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Hard to Resist, Tougher to Avoid — and Devastating to Our Health

By Dr. Robert H. Lustig | Article Featured on Dear Doctor

Do you enjoy the taste of sweet things?

We all do, to some degree. In fact, it’s evolutionary. A sweet tooth served our hunting-and-gathering ancestors well. They knew that if they ate something sweet, it wouldn’t kill them; nothing in nature that tastes sweet is acutely poisonous. It’s ironic, because in the amounts we currently consume it, sugar is a chronic toxin and it is killing us — slowly. I’m not being overly dramatic here; I’m simply stating what scientific research, my own included, has made impossible to ignore.

We are in the midst of a nationwide health crisis, with implications for both dentistry and medicine. Dentists are seeing an increase in tooth decay — despite the addition of tooth-strengthening fluoride to most municipal water supplies. Physicians like myself are seeing many more obese children — some as young as six months old! Thirty years ago, 1 child out of 20 was obese. Today, it’s 1 in 5. Thirty years ago, there were zero children in America with type 2 diabetes. Today, there are 57,000.

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Keeping Your Smile Pretty

How to Keep Your Smile Pretty and Healthy

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by Jeannie Kim | From Health magazine

These days, it seems like everyone’s obsessed with getting a blindingly white grill. But there’s more to taking good care of your mouth than having a soap-star smile.

The condition of your teeth and gums is associated with a host of other health issues that involve your hormones and your heart, and your dental needs can change from decade to decade. Here’s how to keep smiling strong at any age.

Your 30’s: Heed Your Hormones

If you’re pregnant, you might not feel like dragging yourself to the dentist, but you should do it. Higher levels of estrogen and particularly progesterone can result in puffy, tender gums that are vulnerable to minor infection.

Flossing is especially important, experts say, because it helps cut the risk of periodontitis, a more serious gum infection that can endanger more than your teeth: some studies have linked untreated periodontal disease to preterm and low-birth-weight babies.

Perfect Your Stroke

Many adults never learned how to brush and floss properly, says Irwin Smigel, DDS, president of the American Society for Dental Aesthetics. Use a soft brush that has rounded nylon bristles and make gentle circular motions at a 45-degree angle to your gum line.

If flossing hurts or makes your gums bleed, keep working at it. “The more you floss, the tougher your gums become,” explains Paula Jones, DDS, immediate past president of the Academy of General Dentistry.

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Vitamin D May Help Prevent Tooth Decay

Vitamin D May Prevent Tooth Decay

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The sunshine vitamin’s potential role in preventing tooth decay is the latest on its long list of health benefits.

Vitamin D might help prevent tooth decay, a new review of existing studies published in the journal Nutrition Reviews found.

The review includes data from 3,000 children enrolled in 24 clinical trials published from the 1920s to the 1980s. Overall, the trials showed that vitamin D supplementation led to a 50 percent drop in the incidence of tooth decay, perhaps because vitamin D helps the body absorb the tooth-building calcium it needs.

In the trials, the vitamin was delivered either via supplemental UV radiation or by diet products, such as cod liver oil, which contain it.

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Foods that Mask Bad Breath

Foods That Mask Bad Breath

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These common foods can help hide halitosis — at least for a short while.

Maybe you shouldn’t have had those raw onions with your hamburger at lunch, because now you’re faced with bad breath all afternoon. Many people find they can’t hide what they ate because certain foods linger in their systems, causing bad breath. Onions and garlic are probably the most common and most well-known instigators of bad breath, or halitosis, but there are others.

The issue with foods like onions and garlic is that they contain pungent oils that get carried through your bloodstream to your lungs. When you breathe out, the pungent leftovers are exhaled too.

Fortunately, just as eating certain foods can cause your breath to be unpleasant, other foods can help mask bad breath — for a time. “It will only be temporary,” notes Gerald P. Curatola, DDS, clinical associate professor at the New York University College of Dentistry and an oral health and wellness expert for The Dr. Oz Show. The following foods could provide relief for an hour or two, until you are able to attack the underlying cause — odor-producing bacteria in your mouth.

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Healthy Teeth, Healthy Heart

Healthy Teeth, Healthy Heart?

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Experts say that your oral health could clue you in to the condition of your heart — so listen up! Here’s what you should know about the links between your teeth, gums, and ticker.

You brush, floss, and follow all your dentist’s commandments for healthy teeth and gums (kudos!). But did you know that those mouth-healthy habits may ultimately keep your heart healthy, too?

Research has found a surprising number of links between the state of your mouth and your heart. In fact, we now know that people who develop gum disease (either gingivitis, a milder form that results in inflammation and infection of the gums, orperiodontitis, which develops when the inflammation and infection spread below the gum line) are nearly twice at risk for heart disease.

And in one study of 320 adults — half with heart disease — researchers found that these participants were also more likely to have gum disease, bleeding gums, and tooth loss.

What’s the connection? Researchers are still figuring that out.

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19 Habits That Wreck Your Teeth - Sports Drinks - Biermann Orthodontics

Energy and Sports Drinks Eat Away at Teeth

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But beverage industry disputes the claim, saying many factors contribute to enamel erosion.

WEDNESDAY, May 2, 2012 (HealthDay News) — Sports and energy drinks are causing irreversible damage to the teeth of teens and young adults in the United States, the authors of a new study claim.

High acidity levels in the drinks erode tooth enamel, the glossy outer layer of teeth, the researchers contend in the May/June issue of the journal General Dentistry.

“Young adults consume these drinks assuming that they will improve their sports performance and energy levels and that they are ‘better’ for them than soda,” study author Poonam Jain said in a news release from Academy of General Dentistry, which publishes the journal.

However, “most of these patients are shocked to learn that these drinks are essentially bathing their teeth with acid,” Jain said.

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Tea for Healthy Teeth - Biermann Orthodontics

Chew on This: 8 Foods for Healthy Teeth

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Regular brushing and flossing help keep teeth healthy by getting rid of sugars and food particles that team up with bacteria to form plaque. Plaque produces acid that damages tooth enamel, causes cavities and sets the stage for periodontal, or gum, disease.

Now, a growing body of research is finding that certain foods may be good for teeth, too. Just as so-called “functional foods” may keep your heart healthy, for instance, others may promote oral health, according to Christine D. Wu, a pediatric dentistry researcher at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Here are eight teeth-friendly foods that show promise. Read more

Best foods to eat with braces

Best Foods to Eat With New Braces

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With new braces, you may notice that your mouth feels a little different after they’re first put on. To make your transition a little smoother, you may want to change your eating habits for the first few days while you get used to your new braces. Here are our top 5 suggestions for the best kinds of foods to eat when you first get braces:

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