I take good care of my teeth and go to the dentist for cleaning and etc. Why do I keep getting abscessed teeth and why do they keep breaking?? I’m 23 and female.
- Brooke from Wisconsin
Brooke,
I don’t know that I’ll be able to tell you why you keep getting infected teeth without knowing more about your situation. But I’ll give you a couple of ideas.
The best way to prevent new dental decay is by watching your frequency of eating. A lot of people don’t realize that. Every time you eat something, the bacteria on your teeth work on it to create acids that promote tooth decay. Every time you eat, you get an “acid attack.” Now your saliva has built-in defenses against these attacks. It has buffering compounds to neutralize the acids, antibodies to fight the bacteria, and minerals to help remineralize early decay lesions on your teeth. So if you have a minimum number of attacks per day, say three or four, your body can usually keep up with that and repair your teeth as fast as they are attacked. But if you snack throughout the day, you overwhelm your body’s defenses and the tooth decay progresses. For more information, read our page about preventing tooth decay.
Another factor is the quality of the existing dental work. How well you take care of dental work is an important factor in how long it lasts. But it sounds like you keep up a regular schedule of cleanings and checkups and you take care of them at home, so that may not be a factor here. If the dental work is a little sloppy, then sometimes there are gaps between the filling and the tooth where decay can get in and get under existing fillings. Once decay gets in under an existing fillng, it can quickly progress to an infected tooth that needs a root canal treatment. Or, if you have large fillings, it can leave your teeth susceptible to cracking.
Those are a couple of ideas – possibilities.
This blog sponsored by Boca Raton TMJ dentist Dr. David Kagan.