How to look after your child’s baby teeth

Introducing your children to proper dental care is so important when teaching them lessons for life. Just like washing their hands, cleaning their teeth should become an important part of their health and self-care. Kids will be kids though, and they’ll try to skip out on brushing their teeth in the morning and before bed because they’re feeling cheeky. Here’s how to best take care of your child’s baby teeth, and how to teach them to do it too!

It’s all about moderation.

We all have a sweet tooth, especially when we’re children, and sometimes at birthday parties the sugar-rush can really peak. It’s important to teach your children that sugary drinks and snacks may taste nice, but that they should be consumed in moderation. A great way to do this is to introduce sweets and sugary drinks at special occasions or in moderation – allow a little at a time to satiate their cravings but not regularly enough to really make an impact. Fizzy drinks might be okay on the weekend, perhaps, so they’re not being consumed as regularly.

Help them understand why.

It’s super important that your children understand why they should maintain great dental health and care. Break it down into nice sizeable chunks that they can understand or even turn the process of forming a cavity into a story. Help us educate them on why we should always brush our teeth, or not eat too many sweets. Cavities in children are on the increase according to this this article, with the number of children having surgical tooth extractions has risen by 17% since 2013! Teach them how to look after their baby teeth and they’re far more likely to use those same principles on their adult teeth and avoid decay and extraction.

Be a great role model.

While you don’t still have your baby teeth, you children sure do, Show your children the fundamentals and the ins and outs of teeth cleaning so their baby teeth continue to function until it’s their time to wobble. How long to brush for and when to brush are the first boxes to tick in any dental health journey, so start them young! Introduce a fun coloured tooth brush and children’s tooth paste to make the experience and the lesson entirely theirs and brush your teeth with them to reinforce that this is what you should do.

Introduce them to the dentist early.

One of the best ways to ensure your child learns valuable lessons about dental health is by introducing them to the dentist at an early age. Show them we’re nothing to be afraid of and only here to help so that they will continue a long and happy friendship with their dental care provider. Not only this but introducing them early and regularly enough shows your child that visiting the dentist isn’t only cool because you’ve made a new friend, but that it’s necessary. Showing your child that a trip to the dentist isn’t scary but is the right thing to do is a great early step in ensuring that they’ll seek our help again and again.

Bring your child into Harwood Dental Care in Bolton today and say hello to all of our wonderful staff. We promise we won’t bite! Husband and wife team Dipesh and Vitas Patel can’t wait to meet your family, and are passionate about children’s dental care.

Pop into our Bolton practice, speak to a friendly member of staff on 01204 304568 or enquire online today and introduce your family to ours.

You can also read more about how to get stubborn children into the habit of teeth brushing in one of our other blogs.