Ways Your Bad Breath Could mean Bad Health

 

Yuck, what is that smell? Could it be your breath? Checking your breath may not just save you from social moments, but it may save your life. Recurring bad breath could be a sign of underlying medical conditions:

• Electric Nose Technology: Detects lung cancer from bad breath- This is a cheaper alternative than doing a biopsy to detect lung cancer. The "electronic nose" detects different profiles of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in exhaled breaths. All you would need is a simple breath test.
• Breath tests can detect heart failure :By taking a breath test, Researchers can use "mass spectrometry" technology to analyze the sample for molecular and chemical compound signs of heart failure.
• Fish Breath: Kidney Failure: The fishy breath occurs when the kidney failure affects the respiratory system and makes it hard to breath. This is because the damaged kidneys can no longer filter waste products from the blood and turn it into urine.
• Sleep Conditions may cause sour mouth: Saliva decreases during sleep, which causes a breeding ground for bacteria.
• Excess Weight: A poor diet and lack of water can play a major role in bad breath. Try drinking large amounts of water and eating lots of fruit and vegetables, this will help keep breath fresh

A Little Honey A Day May Stop Tooth Decay!

Manuka Honey, Have you ever heard of it? Good, me either!

Honey is sweet and comforting and many people don't even know about all the healing abilities honey has to offer. Honey offers incredible antiseptic, antioxidants and cleansing properties for our body and health.

Manuka Honey is made by bees that feed off of the Manuka bush in New Zealand. This type of honey not only fights infections and helps with tissue healing but it helps reduce the amount of inflammation and scarring. As a side note this honey helps with diarrhea, stomach ulcers and many other problems.

Here are some interesting facts about Manuka Honey:

• Manuka Honey which has  potent antibacterial qualities, that works just as well as mouth wash.
• Most honey consumed in the US is processed and will not have the same healing properties found in raw Manuka Honey.
• Manuka Honey is also known as "Medihoney"

CHEAP DENTURES - Not The Best Solutions

Cheap Dentures-Not The Best Solution

In today's world of technology, cosmetic dentistry is fast becoming one of the most expensive options for people to help improve their appearance. Veneers, Implants and Dentures are among those options. With that in mind, there are many discount facilities out there that claim they can makeover your smile for a fraction of the norm. A good rule of thumb her...e is to remember this: you'll probably get exactly what you pay for! When it comes to dentures, and especially dentures....cheap is not always better! They can cause more problems than they're worth in terms of repairs, adjustments and fit. Don't get me wrong...there are many who need them and simply cannot afford to pay for an expensive set. Trust me, there are still options out there to get affordable dentures. When considering discount dentures as an option to keep costs down, one should always avoid the advertisements from places that offer a "quality product" in one day or less, or a product with sub-grade materials such as plastic.. The bottom line is this: Explore your options! There are facilities out there that will finance your dentures, there are finance companies who will loan to people who qualify, and there are still places available that will make a quality product for less money.

Understanding The Health Risk if Nail Biting

 

 
  

 

 

  As someone who used to bite their finger nails, I can tell you the difficulties of trying to quit. After several years of numerous remedies, I was finally successful! But for many, I know it is a difficult habit to break. Here is some information that might be helpful when you catch yourself biting your nails & hopefully will help you to quit.

Common... sense tells you that biting your nails cannot be good for you. Apart from the fact that you ruin your nails, making it a longer and more difficult process for them to grow well again, there are other health implications.

Children, in particular, will not usually have clean hands. Also much as adults think that their hands are clean, most of us do not wash our hands thoroughly or correctly. Around and under our nails there are many germs and bacteria which can be hidden from view. Similarly we touch everyday objects on a regular basis, such as phones at work, which often harbour a multitude of potentially dangerous infections and bugs. If our hands go to our mouths, especially in order to bite our nails, we can spread so many infections. As your nails and fingers are often in your mouth longer, when biting, the dangers are obvious really.

 Although most biters would spit out nails there are some bits of nails which can escape and end up swallowed. I dread to think what these may do to a person's digestive tract and insides.

As your nails are such a hard surface teeth can be damaged, over long term nail biting. The health of your gums may also suffer due to the germs which you introduce into your mouth.

The condition of your finger ends will usually be bad and the skin dry and cracked. If you bite you nails quite low the fingertips may bleed also. This can cross contaminate you and be extremely painful.

Overall if you continue, like me, to bite your nails over years this habit will:-

Become an even harder habit to break.
Ruin the quality and appearance of your nails.
Spread infections.
Look bad as you are actually doing it.
May cause painful whitlows.                            
May cause tummy and dental problems.         

    

For those of you who really can't stop biting your nails make sure that you scrub those hands as well as a doctor would do when about to perform surgery.

Coffee May Reduce Your Risk Of Oral Cancer

Although this idea is still being researched and is yet to be confirmed, the study is appearing to be promising.

A brief on oral cancer:

People who use tobacco or alcohol are naturally at a higher risk of developing oral/pharyngeal or mouth cancer.  People who have HPV (human papillomavirus) are also at a high risk as recent studies have shown. Oral cancer is difficult to detect in its early stages due to the fact that the symptoms can easily be mistaken as something else.  Common symptoms include mouth sores that don't seem to heal, or pain that will not go away.

Where coffee comes in:

There have been many studies over the years linking coffee to a reduced risk of mouth cancer.  The study which brings us here today actually began in 1982.  Nearly 1 million people took part, submitting their health and lifestyle information, including their tea and coffee intake.  When the study began, all participants were cancer free.  After nearly 30 years of monitoring and follow up, the results of the study were astonishing.  Out of the near million people who participated, 868 people died from oral/pharyngeal or mouth cancer.  When the relation to these deaths with coffee and tea consumption was analyzed, it was found that participants who reported drinking 4 or more cups of caffeinated coffee a day had a 49% reduced risk of death from oral cancer than those who reported drinking less or only having an occasional cup.  Gender, alcohol and tobacco were not a factor.  The link to decaffeinated coffee was insignificant and the link to tea drinkers was non-existent.

What that means now:

While we would all love to believe that coffee is the cure for oral cancer, unfortunately, more research needs to be done.  There are many factors that would need to be considered before they can determine coffee as a guaranteed treatment.  There are also many other types of cancers, this study only focused on one.  So, for now, myself and my fellow coffee drinkers can simply feel a little bit better about our consumption.  As more research and studies unfold, however, I imagine we can expect to see a breakthrough on this idea soon.

Until then, Cheers to coffee!

 

LECOM School Of Dental Medicine- Bradenton Campus- Open For Business!

BRADENTON -- 

A year ago dental students at the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine (LECOM) School of Dental Medicine were only specializing in denture work but now they’re taking patients for a full range of services when it comes to dental health.
“Patients have come from as far as two, three hundred miles away and from the local community right across the street,” said Assistant Dean of Clinical Education Dr. Francis Curd.
The public can now get discounted prices on services ranging from cleanings to crowns. The hands-on, real life experience is something the students are excited to delve into.
The school is looking to accept 200 patients a day in the state-of-the-art facility in Bradenton.
“It’s an extraordinary feeling, I can’t even explain it. We’ve worked so hard to get to this point academically in our studies and also in our pre-clinical work,” said student Jasmine Shafagh.
The comprehensive work is still classwork for the students. This means the services will take a little longer than a regular office would. But LECOM officials say it’s worth the wait.
“They’re going to get thorough care. There will be multiple dentists taking a look with the students,” said Dr. Curd. “They’ll be getting treatment here, ask questions and get the time that you may not be able to get at a private practitioner.”
The second year students will move into their third year in May. Once that is completed, they’ll spend their fourth year in either DeFuniak Springs, Florida or Erie, Pennsylvania.
Contact to find out if you’re eligible for discounted services: (941) 405-1600.

Five Paradox's Of Dentisry

Welcome to the wacky side of dentistry! Oral hygiene is a pretty simple concept... most of the times. If you brush, floss, swish, and rinse, you're on the right track! Every now and then, though, you encounter a fun fact from the dental files that makes you go "hmmmm."

Things aren't always what they seem, and it can be hard to figure out what you're supposed to do to keep your teeth in good shape so you can avoid dental pain and disease in the future. It's okay... take a look at these intriguing dental paradoxes, and we'll do our best to help you sort through them.

1. Enamel is the hardest surface in the body... and also one of the most easily broken. It might sound surprising, but it probably shouldn't be. Take a tap on your teeth... they're pretty tough. Even your bones aren't that hard! But since our teeth are exposed to all kinds of other hard surfaces, bacteria, and food reactions, it's a lot easier to chip a tooth or invite tooth decay than it is to break a bone.
 

2. Chocolate is good for your teeth... but also bad. Sometimes you just can't catch a break. On the one hand, chocolate is made from a cocoa bean that possesses pro-tooth antibacterial properties. On the other, chocolate is also sticky and contains a lot of sugar, which clings to teeth and wears away at enamel. What's a chocolate lover to do? (Well, other than brush, floss, and rinse... that helps!)
 

3. Braces cause cavities. "Wait," you're thinking. "I thought my dentist wanted me to wear braces?" Well, your dentist may very well have referred you to an orthodontist, but while braces are important for many reasons, they actually encourage plaque growth. That's because food particles build up around the metal, which blocks the tongue from tending to its natural tooth-cleaning duties.
 

4. Bleeding means more brushing. If your gums bleed when you brush your teeth, you might think that more brushing seems counterintuitive. But unless you bled from pressing too hard with your brush (something you should never do), bleeding gums are typically a sign of infection. To battle it, you need to see a dentist and step up your oral hygiene right away... and that begins with better brushing, twice a day.
 

5. Fluoride is only a good thing sometimes... or is it? Fluoride is actually a somewhat controversial topic, and we always encourage those who are concerned about it to have a talk with their dentist. That said, the American Dental Association (ADA) recommends that localities fluoridate their community's water supplies to strengthen the population's teeth, and that is indeed what happens in many towns. But even if fluoride may be good when swallowed in water, it's never good when swallowed in the form of toothpaste. Yes, many toothpastes are themselves fluoridated, but when people (usually children) swallow the paste, it can cause teeth to become excessively porous, and may invite other problems as well.

DID YOU FIND ANY SURPRISES?

How to Nurse a Weekend Toothache

 

 

 

 

 

 

So it's the weekend and everyone is busy.. And where are you? At home with a toothache, wishing Monday would hurry up and arrive so you can get to a dentist. Here's a few tips on how to make it throughout that painful weekend with out suffering completely:

- Try rinsing your mouth out first. Take a mouthful of room-temperature water and rinse vigorously. Many times, a painful toothache can caused simply by trapped food.

-If that doesn't work, try flossing GENTLY. This should get rid of the problem, unless your problem is something other than just stuck food.

-Numb the pain- Take a shot of whiskey (do not swallow it), and hold it in your mouth right over the painful tooth. Your gums will absorb the alcohol and it will numb the pain.

-Rinse with salt water- Make sure the water is room temperature. This is very soothing and cleansing and will help keep it from getting any worse.

-Massage your hand- No, I'm not kidding. Rubbing an ice-cube in the V-shape between your index finger and your thumb for 5-7 minutes can reduce the pain by 50%.

-Put a little clove oil on it- You can purchase this over the counter. Simply drop a little right on the tooth.
                                                                                                         
-Try not to bite- This is a no-brainer. Obviously, if you have a toothache, try not to bite on that side whatsoever.

-Try icing it up- This may not work if you have sensitivity to cold. If you don't, you might try sucking on an ice cube- on or near that tooth. If sucking on an ice-cube isn't going to work, try puting an icepack on your cheek in 15 minute intervals.
                                     
-Shut your mouth- If you are having sensitivity to cold, breathing through your mouth can cause even more pain. Try breathing through your nose.

-Take Aspirin- And no, don't put it directly on your tooth or gum, this can cause damage. Actually take and swallow an aspirin every 4-6 hours.                                       
                                                                     
-Keep it cool- Try to avoid getting to warm or hot. And definitely avoid placing heat on the area. Heat draws infection to the surface, making it worse and more painful.

This information is not intended to replace regular, professional dental care. Do-it-yourself dentistry is never a good idea. These tips are to GET YOU BY until you can see a dental professional. This information was gathered from various online sources.