I'm Janel Robinson, and I'm thankful you're taking the time to read my blog! A little about me....I am a mother of ten (yes, 10!) kids, I am a dental hygienist who is passionate about my career and my patients, I'm a Christian, a sister, a daughter, a friend, and occasionally an adversary.
I never considered how difficult it would be to answer this question until a patient I provided care for about six months ago. As a parent, I believe oral piercings are dangerous and unnecessary. I personally would not consent to them for any of my minor children. As a hygienist, I know the dangers of oral piercings and have seen the damage they cause - specifically, gingival recession. But here is where the difficulty was: I had a patient with a lingual frenum ("tongue web") piercing. It quickly became apparent the patient's mother did not know about the piercing. This was perplexing to me because the patient already had an exam by Dr. (X) before I came to start her prophy.
When Crest introduced the Pro-Health line of products in August 2006, Proctor & Gamble advertised it as triclosan-free products with antimicrobial properties. Pro-Health products began to gain popularity with both dental professionals and the general public through P&G's advertising. Oral-B started selling trial-sized Pro-Health toothpaste and mint to dental professionals for patient care, and Pro-Health is now a well-established and widely used dentifrice.
Gummy vitamins and candies have become increasingly popular. At least five times a day I have the gummy vitamin discussion with a parent. Breaking the news to caregivers that their child will need extensive dental work to repair decay in deciduous molars because of gummy vitamin use is frustrating! These parents are trying to take excellent care of their child by making sure they have all their nutritional needs met, but have inadvertently caused potentially serious dental issues. We as providers are disappointed in the gummy vitamin industry as a whole.
I want to kick off the dental health topics with an article I wrote recently. It was inspired an 8 yo patient I treated who had been recently diagnosed with Lupus. She is being raised by her grandfather and he had no idea how Lupus affects the mouth and what, if anything could be done to help. A quick Google Scholar search confirmed my suspicion....the oral effects of Lupus are similar in children and adults. I grabbed some letter head and a pen and scribbled out some instructions for Grandad. The following weekend I did a deeper dive into evidence-based care for kiddos with Lupus and wrote an article for parents.
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