In this video, Dr. Nammy talks about cavities – what they are, what causes them, what happens if they aren’t taken care of, and how crowns can be made to protect the tooth if the cavity is bad enough, so you can continue to keep your teeth and avoid root canals.
Transcript
A cavity is basically a hole in the tooth structure. It’s actually caused by a number of things, mainly bacteria. It can also be caused by acid reflux or anything of that sort. What happens is that bacteria live there for a long time. As they live there for a long time, they’re dividing, so they release acids. Those acids eat away your teeth, and they cause the cavities. Hence, you get the same reaction if you have acid reflux, or having lemon water significantly, or also have dry mouth, because it increases the acidity of the mouth and that will dissolve the natural tooth structure and create a hole.
Now that hole needs to get filled, otherwise, there will be a lot of pain. It can lead to a root canal. It can lead to tooth loss, and it doesn’t look good. So what we focus on to fix the problem is to plug the cavity. If it’s a small cavity, we’re able to do it with a BPA-free filling. The next step is it’s going to be a crown. A crown is a cap on the tooth. What the cap does, it helps protect the teeth so that you can keep your teeth longterm, and then chew properly, and also stay comfortable.
The way we do crowns in our practice is through 3D milling, which is really nice because you can get it done in two hours instead of two visits. What usually happens is you come in, get numbed up, we take a 3D mold of your tooth, and we actually make the crown on-site. Then we go ahead and cement that crown. So by the time that the two hours are done, you’re actually able to go home and chew, eat your natural food, and not have to worry about coming back.
