Last Updated on January 10, 2020
© The Pain WebIn the last three decades, there has been an increasing focus on educating the population on the importance of maintaining healthy teeth and gums with good oral hygiene.
This was crucial to implementing healthy habits in most children that would stick with them throughout their adult life – who will eventually pass those oral care habits on to future generations.
But even though more and more people are regularly brushing their teeth and flossing, a large proportion of them still disregard the importance of regular dental check-ups and ignore some signs of dental problems. One of the most common issues are tooth cavities (also known as caries or tooth decay), and they are a direct result of the modern diet – which includes lots of sugary drinks and snacks – and poor cleaning.
– What is a tooth cavity?
A cavity is a hole in the tooth enamel, the visible part of the tooth. This erosion of the enamel is due to acids made by the bacteria present in plaque – a sticky substance that transforms sugar into acid. Over time, the acid will wear out the tooth and causes a cavity.
It is very hard to identify this issue at an early stage as it usually starts with a very small cavity in the tooth, thus the importance of regular dental check-ups.
Your dentist will be able to identify and quickly perform a tooth cavity filling – a painless technique (local anesthesia is used) that involves removing the decay and inserting a composite resin filling to restore tooth functionality.
But your dentist might not even allow any decay to develop at all since regular check-ups presuppose a cleaning procedure called oral prophylaxis to remove tartar and stains which helps tremendously in caries prevention.
If not treated, tooth cavity can lead to complications such as inflammation, infection, abscess formation, and tooth loss. Below we will discuss all tooth cavity symptoms, so you can pinpoint when there is something wrong inside your mouth and rapidly schedule an appointment with your dentist.
