Gum Disease, and What You Can Do About It

Periodontal disease is an even more frightening-seeming word for gum disease. Whatever you call it, gum disease is an infection of the soft tissues that surround your teeth and line your gums. While it’s easy to overlook your gums, you really shouldn’t. They’re important because they seal your teeth and the sensitive parts of your teeth and jaw from bacteria in your mouth. Gum infections can degrade those tissues, reduce the protection they provide to the roots of your teeth, and allow infection to progress into and beyond your mouth and jaw.

Gum disease presents in two forms: as minor and reversible gingivitis; and as much more serious and dangerous periodontitis. Both conditions are treatable, but reversing gingivitis is much easier than undergoing periodontal disease treatment near you for periodontitis. 

What are the symptoms of gum disease?

Understanding what gum disease looks like is easier when you realize what healthy gums are supposed to look like. Healthy gum tissue is pale pink, firm, and lays around the base of your teeth snugly. Here, on the other hand, are symptoms of periodontitis:

• Puffy and swollen gums that bleed easily
• Gum tissue that is red or purple rather than pink
• If your toothbrush is bloody or you spit out blood after brushing or flossing
• If it hurts to chew
• If you have persistent bad breath
• Pus oozing from between your teeth or beneath the lip of your gums
• There seem to be wider spaces between your teeth
• Your teeth feel loose, or you’ve lost teeth
• If your gums seem to be shrinking or your teeth look longer than usual.

What can you do to prevent gum disease?

Do you know what the first few answers are going to be? Yep, you got it. Brush, floss, visit your dentist in Flagstaff for twice-annual checkups, have your teeth cleaned annually, and undergo all recommended dental treatment. It really is as easy as that. Those basic daily and annual dental hygiene habits will, in most situations, keep your gums and teeth healthy. Better still, if any gum health issues do develop, your dentist will be able to identify them right away and intervene to get you back on track.

What else can you do? Your diet is essential to your overall health, and that’s no less true when it comes to your teeth and gums. By eating lots of fresh fruits and vegetables and minimizing your consumption of refined carbs, caffeine and sugar, you can increase the chance of maintaining a healthy mouth — especially if you focus on adding some more of these vitamins to your diet:

• Vitamin A in beef, liver, milk, cheese and eggs aids the healing of inflamed gum tissues
• Vitamin B found in mushrooms, meat, fish and supplements can help keep toothaches, receding gums and sensitivity of mucous membranes at bay
• Vitamin C contained in fruits and vegetables promotes the healing of bleeding gums and helps to prevent gum inflammation while also preventing plaque formation
• Vitamin D found in cheese, milk and fatty fish and also generated from sun exposure can help prevent your gums from becoming inflamed and help your body and teeth to absorb calcium
• Vitamin E found in sunflower seeds, peanut butter, tomato paste and turnip greens (or in a capsule form) can relieve infants’ sore gums during teething and also helps to promote the absorption of calcium.

If you’ve experienced any of the symptoms of gum disease or are concerned about the health of your gums, make an appointment for a checkup at a dental clinic near you for advice about keeping your gums healthy and gum disease treatment in Flagstaff.