Dental Cavities: What You Need to Know

Dental cavities, also known as tooth decay or dental caries, develop when your tooth enamel (the outermost layer of the tooth) gets eroded by acids. These acids come from the breakdown of sugars in your mouth. If left untreated, the cavity, which looks like a dark hole in your tooth, grows larger and deeper.

This decay can reach the nerve (which is the innermost portion of the tooth) and cause infection.  It may even lead to your tooth breaking off and make it unrestorable.

How to Repair Dental Caries

If cavities are caught early enough, then they can easily be repaired by having a small filling placed by the professionals at Studfield Dental Group in our Wantrina South facility. During the process of a tooth-colored filling, our dentist will remove all present decay. Then we’ll prep the remaining healthy tooth with special solutions, and place a composite filling material in the void, building your tooth back up.

Avoiding Dental Cavities

To prevent decay, you should avoid drinking overly sweet or acidic drinks. Stay away from soft drinks and sports drinks or orange juice and lemonade. If you do consume these now and then, at a minimum you should rinse your mouth with water to remove the majority of the sugars and allow your mouth to return to normal ph. Getting in the habit of making water the drink of your choice will help keep tooth decay away. Brushing too soon could cause the acids to spread around even more.

You should brush your teeth at least twice a day, and floss once per day.  Also, visiting our Wantrina South dental office twice per year for a scale and clean appointment will help ensure that those areas of your mouth that are hard to reach, are cleaned of all plaque and bacteria.

We Can Help You Stay Healthy

Studfield Dental Group is conveniently open on Saturdays and Sundays, so give us a call today; we can help you keep tooth decay away!