How To Care For Your Baby’s Early Teeth

Ogbugoh Terundu Joy

Good dental care is not limited to adults alone. A baby’s early teeth needs to be cared for because it is useful for chewing, smiling and speaking. Here are five ways to do so:

1. Start Early: Make it a habit to clean her gums and tongue with a damp washcloth even before the first tooth sprouts. This singular act would clean out milk residue and leave her mouth fresh and free of breeding bacteria.

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2. Cloth Cleaning: The first set of baby teeth would appear at about 6 months or sooner. When it does, start cleaning by using a damp cloth wrapped around your index finger. Clean softly inside baby’s mouth, rubbing it over the new tooth as you go.

3. Sanitize Pacifiers, Toys And Teethers: Babies put everything in their mouth including by reflex and for comfort when they start teething. The baby at this stage would be in desperate need to ease the discomfort of by chewing on teethers, fingers and on anything they can lay their hands on to find some relief.

Toys, pacifiers, teethers as well as anything babies put in their mouths should be disinfected to kill growing fungus and molds. This way, the fungus or bacteria likely to breed on dirty toys would not get into the baby’s mouth to cause decay to the teeth or the soft tissues even before the teeth thrives.

4. Start Brushing When She Clocks Two: Use a soft brush and tooth paste designed and produced babies. Apply a small amount of the toothpaste to the brush and gently brush your baby’s teeth and tongue. Spitting out the excess toothpaste and water may prove difficult as they are likely swallow it, but that’s okay. With constant practice, and your assistance, she would learn the act of spitting out and eventually brushing herself.

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5. Avoid Eating At Bedtime: Sometimes parents let their baby’s go to sleep sucking at their feeding bottle filled with milk or juice. This is wrong as it can create cavities. It is advised for baby’s to ditch foods and their bottles when going to sleep.

6. Cut Down On Sugary Foods. Children naturally have a sweet tooth, and a mother’s maternal instinct is to indulge her child. While occasional indulgence is not bad, constantly loading your child’s body with sugary foods such as donuts, ice cream, chocolates, sweets etc would eventually cause damage to her teeth as well as her health if care is not taken.