The tooth broke and a small piece fell off

In daily life, we often encounter such problems. We accidentally fall and cause a small piece of our teeth to be broken off. If a small piece of tooth is broken off, we need to fill the tooth in time because the enamel is likely to be damaged. If the tooth is not filled in time, it will damage the nerves over time and prevent further decay of the teeth, and then cause caries. Tooth decay is very harmful to the human body.

What is dental caries?

Dental caries is what we call tooth decay and tooth decay, which is mainly caused by the erosion of the tooth surface by the decomposition products of bacteria in the oral cavity. Symptoms include blackening of the teeth, holes in the teeth, with or without pain. No abnormalities can be felt in the early stages, only yellowing or blackening of the tooth surface may be noticed. Over time, especially if you don't pay attention to oral hygiene and allow food residues to remain on the tooth surface, bacteria can break down the sugar in the food to produce acid, which then gradually corrodes the teeth to form black holes. If it continues to affect the dental nerves, it will cause severe pain. Secondary infection of dental caries can form lesions, causing or inducing other systemic diseases such as arthritis, periostitis, chronic kidney disease and various eye diseases. Dental caries should be prevented through health care.

Diagnosis of dental caries

The commonly used diagnostic method for caries is to observe whether the surface color of the affected tooth becomes black or yellow-black, and whether there are caries holes. The diagnosis of caries is mainly differentiated from dental hypersensitivity.

Tooth hypersensitivity, also known as dentin hypersensitivity or allergic dentin, is a symptom of pain caused by external stimuli such as temperature (cold, hot), chemicals (acid, sweet) and mechanical action (friction or biting hard objects). It is characterized by rapid onset, sharp pain and short duration. Tooth hypersensitivity is a common symptom of various dental diseases. When caries occurs, dental hypersensitivity mainly manifests as irritation pain, which will be caused by brushing teeth, eating hard objects, sour, sweet, cold, hot and other stimuli. The tooth is especially sensitive to mechanical stimulation. The most reliable diagnostic method is to slide a sharp probe across the tooth surface to find one or several sensitive areas.

If it is difficult to determine the location of caries, a dental X-ray can be taken, where a black shadow can be seen. If conditions permit, optical fiber transillumination, electrical impedance, ultrasound, elastic mold separation, staining and other technologies can be used to improve the accuracy and sensitivity of early diagnosis of dental caries.

The harm of dental caries

1. 8 major hazards of dental caries to children

(1) Reduced chewing function: Tooth defects involving multiple deciduous molars can reduce chewing function;

(2) Impact on oral health: Food residues are retained in the caries cavity, and bacteria gather. If not paid attention to for a long time, it will affect children's oral health and affect the occurrence of caries in permanent teeth;

(3) The permanent tooth germ is affected: apical periodontitis of deciduous teeth affects the permanent tooth germ, causing its enamel development and normal eruption to be impaired;

(4) Abnormal tooth growth position: premature loss of deciduous teeth due to caries causes the space between permanent teeth to narrow, resulting in abnormal position due to insufficient space;

(5) Damage to oral mucosal tissue: The carious and damaged crowns of deciduous teeth are prone to damage the local oral mucosal tissue;

(6) Impact on nutritional intake: Severe caries of deciduous teeth reduces chewing function, affects children's nutritional intake, and affects their growth and development;

(7) Induce periapical disease: Caries of deciduous teeth develop into periapical disease, which can act as lesions and cause other tissues of the body to become infected;

(8) Affecting appearance and correct pronunciation: When children have tooth decay, if it is on the back teeth, the appearance will not be affected much, but if it is on the front teeth, it will affect the appearance. It may even affect pronunciation because of loose speech and air leakage during normal speech.

2. Three major hazards of dental caries to adults

(1) Causes sepsis or bacteremia: often causes inflammation of the root tip and other parts of the tooth, and in severe cases, local swelling; if pus and bacteria are absorbed, it can cause sepsis or bacteremia;

(2) Increase the burden on the gastrointestinal tract; bad tooth roots cannot chew food; increase the burden on the gastrointestinal tract;

(3) Impact on the health of the elderly: For the elderly, severe caries can cause most or all of their teeth to be lost, which limits their nutritional intake and reduces the amount of nutrients they absorb, which is not conducive to their physical health.