Originally Posted by OHSue
Originally Posted by Sharon321
Second, babies do not leech calcium for your teeth. Pregnancy does however change the quality of your saliva, increase inflammation of gum tissue and nausea or acid reflux can increase the acidity in the mouth. Also many women if nausous of tissues inflammed do not do adequate home care.
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Yes their are "bad" dentists just like every other profession. Detection of decay is not black or white but a judgement call which will differ from dentist to dentist. Personally with your history of lapses in your recare visits and exams, I would fill anything suspicious because a borderline area will need a root canal and crown in two years. So to avoid that, he may be recommending filling in areas that he would watch in a more regular interval patient.
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Have them show you pictures of these area and do an evaluation of all your risk factors. You need more information before you start treatment.
Glad you spoke up about the baby leaching calcium issue, even though several posters said it did. As a nurse it didn't make sense to me. As for the dental assistant doing the cleaning, most folks don't know the difference between a dental assistant and a hygenist and use the terms interchangably.
First, if I didn't say it before in a post, Sharon, it was great hearing from a professional. Your info was very helpful! I thought your point about a dentist trying to be proactive for patients who don't get regular care especially insightful. It would just be better if dentists would share their reasoning with us. Something like, "Look, you have some incipient cavities. They don't need filling just now, but you can choose to come back in 6 months for a re-evaluation or we can fill them today."
Sue, great hearing from a nurse, too. Most of us go by our own experiences and what we've read, but that falls short of formal training and daily experience on the job.
Sue, it's true, we lay folk do use assistant and hygienist interchangeably, though I've known a few offices where the same person held both roles. Though that may have been years ago.
I read several posts saying pregnancy caused changes in their teeth, but most posters did NOT specifically say the baby leaches calcium even when they did mention calcium as an issue. Of course when a mother and a fetus are competing for nutrients, the body tries to make sure the fetus gets enough, even at the expense of the mother, but this isn't the only thing that happens in pregnancy.