An answer to "What causes cavities" and what you can do about it...
Hey everybody,
I see cavity/oral health questions pop up on a frequent basis here, so I wanted to give you my take. For context, I am the founder of The Burkitt Center - a dental office in South Nashville, TN that focuses on changing the average patient experience at the dentist from one of fear to one of comfort, prevention, comprehension. I'll give you a breakdown of what really causes cavities and what you can do about it.
What causes cavities? An ELI5:
* Acid causes cavities. A cavity is when the tooth dissolves away into a bacterial pothole. This happens when acid sits on your teeth too long.
What causes acid on your teeth?
* You get acid on your teeth 3 main ways:
1) From INGESTING acid. This would be drinking any acidic substance. This could be water with a ton of lemon juice in it, or monster energy drinks, or mountain dew, etc. If your drink has a pH level below 5.5, then it is acidic enough to dissolve into the tooth and start the cavity process. Prevention: I would either a) stay away from acidic drinks or b) drink the acidic drink fast (5 minutes) and then swish your mouth out with water to get the acid off your teeth. The worst thing you can do is sip on the acidic drink every 20 minutes, leaving your teeth coated in acid all day. Your saliva is built to clean the acid off, hence why people who have "dry-mouth" have a lot more cavities. Let your saliva do the work by drinking your acidic drink quickly and being done with it. Your acidic drink is twice as bad if it has processed sugar in it (more below).
2) From REGURGITATING acid. This is acid reflux. This usually occurs when people sleep. Briefly, you clench and grind your teeth together to open your airway to breath better. If you aren't getting enough oxygen to your brain or heart, your brain stimulates your teeth to clench/grind to hold your airway open. A part of this lack of oxygen in your brain may cause your diaphragm to flex when you finally breathe again, which may cause acid to wash up from your stomach onto your teeth without you ever knowing it. This can eat into your teeth slowly, causing cavities or overall erosion. Prevention: If you've ever been told you snore, or if you know you clench and grind (which most people do), I would recommend a sleep study. We have some at our office that we send home with our patients (an at-home sleep study) that can give us an idea if they have a breathing problem while they sleep.
And the last way that someone can get acid on their teeth is:
3) The bacteria on their teeth secreting acid themselves. Weird right? Your oral bacteria eat the same foods you eat. When you eat healthy, whole foods, the bacteria are not stressed. But when you eat anything processed, the bacteria eat this too, get stressed, and then they secrete acid onto and between your teeth. Prevention: If you eat processed foods, especially ultra processed foods, and you don't immediately get that stuff off your teeth, you are setting yourself up to have a ton of acid on your teeth. Then add to that the possibility of drinking soft drinks and maybe even an acid reflux problem, and you can see why cavities are so prevalent.
What to do:
Ultimately, eating whole foods and staying away from acidic drinks, while making sure you don't have acid reflux, will go a very long way. We all understand that it's difficult in today's world for many people to commit to all whole foods. If this is the case with you, then just make sure you do one of the following: 1) brush and floss well after eating or 2) if you just ate a super acidic meal, swish your mouth out with water and brush in 30 minutes after your teeth have been remineralized.
There may be exceptions to some of this, or you may be in a special situation. Happy to discuss this further in the replies. If you enjoyed this information, I can go more into fluoride, silver fillings, or anything else dental related, just let me know.
Thanks
Dr. Will
EDIT: Adding - all saliva is not created equal either. If you don't get your vitamins and minerals, your saliva will not be adequately set up to remineralize the small spots on your teeth that are starting to get cavities. It is absolutely true that small cavities are reversible. It's not woo-woo. It's as simple as the acid on your teeth get a small spot of enamel erosion, and your saliva takes the minerals and repairs it. There - cavity reversed. Simple science. BUT if you aren't consuming the correct vitamins and minerals through whole foods, then even if you are letting your saliva do it's thing, it won't be helping as much as you want...