Boyles General Dentistry Blog

Out of all the materials in your body, your tooth enamel is the strongest, but that doesn’t mean teeth are impervious to breaking. Enamel makes up just the small outer layer of teeth with softer, more sensitive layers underneath. When this material undergoes too much stress, it can crack, exposing the center.

Because of teeth’s vulnerability, you shouldn’t chew on pens or pencils as well as other objects that don’t belong in your mouth. But even certain kinds of food may be risky! Although you should be able to handle biting and chewing most foods easily, others can increase your risk of cracking a tooth or two.

The average person makes roughly 35,000 decisions every day. Some are simple and require very little thought, such as following your routine and brushing your teeth before you leave the house for work. Others, however, can be more challenging. If you want to correct visual flaws in your smile, you have an important decision to make: should you go with veneers or cosmetic bonding?

Although both are great options, you have to choose which will best help you achieve your desired smile. Here is some information to help you decide with confidence.

If it has been more than six months since you’ve last seen your dentist, you might feel a bit uncertain about scheduling an appointment after all this time. Life can get busy, causing you to miss these regular dental visits. It’s common and happens all the time. What you don’t want to do is to continue putting off meeting with your dentist out of fear. As you prepare for your upcoming appointment, here are four things you can expect when being welcomed back into the dentist’s office.

You hate to admit it, but visiting the dentist is a frightening thought. Maybe it’s even kept you from going to appointments in the past. What if there was a way you could have a more enjoyable experience in the chair? It may sound too good to be true, but sedation dentistry may be the answer you’ve been looking for, but it’s natural for you to have questions about this miracle solution. Below you’ll find some of the most common questions about sedation and responses that should put your hesitation and fears to rest.

To someone unfamiliar with dental sedation, it can seem a little mysterious. A nervous patient is given a sedative and then is magically more relaxed. They may wake up later and realize their dental work is already done or have problems recalling their time in the chair. Consequently, many myths circulate about dental sedation, but here is the truth behind them!

These days, nearly everyone watches every dime they have. Even if you aren’t living paycheck to paycheck, staying within budget is probably important to you and your family’s financial security. So when your dentist offers sedation to help manage your dental anxiety, you hesitate to take advantage of it because of the additional cost.

Sedation typically costs a couple of hundred dollars, which can feel like a lot of money at first. Keep reading to learn more about the cost of sedation and why it may be money well spent.

You consider yourself to be a smart person. When it comes to important decisions, you weigh the options, think about the pros and cons, ask experts for advice, and do your research. In replacing your lost teeth, you have a life-changing choice ahead of you, namely which type of restoration you want. Whatever you pick, it will affect you every day for years to come.

In selecting your replacement teeth, you need to consider more than just the short-term benefits. In fact, you should seriously think about the lifespan of dental implants and other restorations, the cost, and prolonging your replacement teeth.

You’ve likely experienced a bad taste in your mouth sometimes. Often enough, the cause is harmless— spicy or sour food, black coffee, etc. However, this bitterness can be concerning if it’s constant. Should that happen, you may have an oral issue that needs urgent treatment. As for why that’s the case, your Odessa dentist is here to tell you. Read on, then, to learn what a bitter taste in your mouth means and why to get dental care for it.

Do you tend to get cavities often? Although there could be many underlying causes, your enamel may be weak. Although you can’t necessarily get enamel back, you can reinforce it with the right nutrients: calcium and fluoride. You know about calcium-rich foods you can have to help, but what about fluoride? Can you get it from another source besides your toothpaste? Keep reading to learn about drinks and foods with fluoride.

No one likes to feel uncomfortable, but it can be tricky to know if the discomfort automatically means something is wrong. When it comes to tooth pain, however, it rarely is a good sign. But what kinds of tooth pain should you be most concerned about? When should you contact your emergency dentist? Here is a breakdown of the types of tooth pain to take seriously and schedule an urgent appointment for.