Preventitive Procedures: How Plaque is Formed and Becomes Calculus, How Cavities Form, and Periodontal Disease

Gingivitis and Periodontists

First off everyone needs to know how plaque is formed. You know the shiny/ wet looking part of teeth, that is called the material alba. The material alba is the perfect place for bacteria to chill out and congregate because it is a sticky substance. After the bacteria has stuck to the material alba, it begins to colonize and produce the plaque (soft deposit). After only 24 hours of the bacteria colonizing it becomes pathogenic and start to irritate your gums. That's why its so important to brush your teeth everyday. Its important to brush off the plaque because then it has to re-colonize all over again.

the white part at the bottom of the gum line is the calculus

After the plaque has colonized and has not been removed, it will turn into calculus (a hard deposit) making removal impossible without a dentist because it cannot be removed with a tooth brush, only a scalar.

This calculus, if left untreated, will be in the sulcus (where your gum attaches to your tooth) and the gums will start to recede and become red, very sore, and bleed when you floss. This can turn into gingivitis. Gingivitis is a form of periodontal disease.

 

You can see the red and inflamed gums along the gum line

If you still don't brush and most importantly do not floss it can become much worse. You can start to get periodontists which is the recession of bone!

You can see how the gums have receded all the way down to the bone and look like they're about to fall out, because the supporting structures are gone just because of plaque and it being pathogenic.

Cavities


A cavity is the wearing away of the tooth enamel. To get a cavity you need to have fermentable carbohydrates (sugar) , a certain type of bacteria, and a susceptible tooth. Together the sugars and the bacteria make an acid and then the acid gets deposited on the tooth causing it to wear away.

You may find that some people don't get cavities very easily, but others get them all the time no matter how often they brush they're teeth. If a person has had fluoridated water, or lots of dental care, they may be less susceptible to tooth decay. On the other hand, a person could have a lot more of the specific bacteria in they're mouth making it harder for them to prevent cavities.

The easiest way to prevent cavities is too eat less sugar less frequently. For example, if I bought a huge bag of candy and ate it all in 20 minutes, or if I ate one candy every half an hour, which do you think would be worse for my teeth? Believe it or not it is worse to eat one candy every half hour, because your teeth are having an "acid attack" and those attacks last up to 20 minutes and it takes 2 hours after that to return to a normal pH balance.

The most common place for cavities is on your back molars because it is the hardest to reach with a toothbrush and also because that it where one of our salivary ducts are.