Invisalign

The doctors at Bear Creek Dental are excited to offer Invisalign smiles to patients looking to straighten their teeth without traditional braces.  Invisalign is the invisible alternative to traditional braces for adults and teens recommended to correct mild to moderate spacing or crowding of the teeth. An Invisalign treatment plan consists of a series of clear, removable plastic aligners that are custom-made for your teeth, and a typical treatment plan can be completed in less than a year.

To straighten your teeth with Invisalign, we begin with an examination. A dentist can determine if Invisalign will be effective in achieving the smile you want. Impressions or scans of your teeth are used to create a full set of aligners customized to your teeth and your treatment plan. Each set of aligners is worn for about two weeks, depending on your individual treatment plan. For the best results a set of aligners should be worn at least 20 hours a day. You should remove the aligners to eat, and to brush and floss.

Bear Creek Dental is located at Unit 201 10015 102 Ave, Grande Prairie, Alberta, T8v 0z8, Canada. To schedule an appointment, call 780-539-0404 or visit BearCreekDental.CA.

Night Guards

At Bear Creek Dental, we help our patients with every aspect of their oral care, including teeth grinding. Also known as bruxism, this behavior is commonly the result of sleep apnea and can cause headaches and neck aches, as well as tooth damage. CPAP machines are the most commonly employed means of combatting sleep apnea, but they may not defend against bruxism, for which patients need an oral appliance known as a night guard.

Like the mouth guard used to protect athletes, a night guard is custom-made from an impression of the patient’s mouth. The durable material resists grinding better than enamel. But a night guard also provides the wearer with more restful sleep by keeping the jaws in a forward position. Sleep apnea is often the result of patients’ airways getting closed off during sleep, and teeth grinding is sometimes a result of the body attempting to open airways by changing jaw position. The forward position maintained by night guards is the optimal one for airflow, removing a cause of bruxism as well as preventing damage.

Tough though they are, night guards still need to be protected during the day by being kept in a hard plastic container. They and the container also need to be cleaned and dried on a daily basis.

Bear Creek Dental is located at Unit 201 10015 102 Ave, Grande Prairie, Alberta, T8v 0z8, Canada. To schedule an appointment, call 780-539-0404 or visit BearCreekDental.CA.

 

How to Clean Dentures

We always encourage proper oral hygiene at Bear Creek Dental, but people may not always be aware of how oral hygiene practices must change if they get dentures. Regardless of whether the dentures are partial or replace all of a patient’s natural teeth, they are made of very different material and require more care.

While it is always a good idea to use soft-bristled toothbrushes, dentures also require specially designated toothpaste which lacks the gritty minerals of toothpaste for natural teeth. This is because natural teeth produce a protective film and can incorporate fluoride into their enamel, but dentures can neither protect nor repair themselves. Patients should also continue to brush inside their mouths (perhaps with a different toothbrush), being sure to clean their tongues and any exposed abutments, in cases where dentures are supported by implants.

Dentures need to be removed on a nightly basis. This will provide the patient’s gums with a chance to rest. But while moving dentures, it is important to remember how fragile they are. Keep them above a towel or other soft surface and put them in room temperature, not hot, water or cleaning solution. Even well-cared for dentures will need to be adjusted as the patient’s mouth naturally changes shape. This should only be done by a professional.

Bear Creek Dental is located at Unit 201 10015 102 Ave, Grande Prairie, Alberta, T8V 0Z8, Canada. To schedule an appointment, call 780-539-0404 or visit BearCreekDental.CA.

 

Consequences of Thumb Sucking

Bear Creek Dental in Grande Prairie is a family dentistry office and we’re happy to guide parents caring for their children’s oral health. Many parents of young children notice their children sucking their thumbs or give them pacifiers and wonder whether this is having an impact on their oral health. The answer depends largely on how close the child is to getting permanent teeth.

Babies’ skeletons are not fully fused together and their faces are more flexible than those of adults. Thumb sucking by children four and under is unlikely to have a permanent effect on their mouth structures. But baby teeth usually start falling out when a child is around five, and continued thumb (or pacifier) sucking as permanent teeth come in could result in an overbite or in misaligned jaws.

It is advisable to try to include the child in creating strategies to break their bad habits because using coercive measures may not address the underlying problem. Common though thumb sucking is, it sometimes results from stress. Children who feel a need to self-soothe often replace thumb sucking with pushing their tongues against their front teeth, which also causes overbites. Though corrective orthodontic devices are available, it may be necessary to consult a child psychologist.

Bear Creek Dental is located at Unit 201 10015 102 Ave, Grande Prairie, Alberta, T8v 0z8, Canada. To schedule an appointment, call 780-539-0404 or visit BearCreekDental.CA.

HPV and Oral Cancer

We don’t just treat teeth at Bear Creek Dental; as practitioners of general dentistry, our Grande Prairie office also provides preventive care for oral pathologies. Recently, there’s been a major change in the landscape of oral cancer as cancers associated with the human papilloma virus (HPV) have outpaced those associated with smoking, and we want to ensure our patients know how to use us as a resource.

There are nearly two hundred known strains of HPV, only nine of which are known to cause cancer, and only one of which is known to cause mouth and throat cancer. The non-cancerous strains of HPV are extremely common, but there is no way of testing for them in the mouth. To complicate matters further, cancer caused by HPV usually occurs far back in the throat, in a region called the oropharynx. This region cannot be tested with standard office equipment used to check for cancer in the oral cavity, though doctors can perform tactile examinations.

Patients need to be aware that abstaining from smoking does not make them immune from oral cancer. Numbness, swelling, and pain in the throat and the region between the ears and jaw are warning signs of an infection, and it’s worthwhile to ask us about throat cancer. Though rates of infection are going up, fatalities are going down as public awareness increases.

Bear Creek Dental is located at Unit 201 10015 102 Ave, Grande Prairie, Alberta, T8v 0z8, Canada. To schedule an appointment, call 780-539-0404 or visit BearCreekDental.CA.