Pediatric Dentist Portland & Oregon City » pediatric

Tips For Parents Who Have Kids In Braces

Bill E. Kidd — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 03:40:57 +0000

Twenty years ago having braces was more embarrassing than anything else for a child. However, today braces are being seen as a fashion statement with people in Asia even buying prosthetic braces kits to apply at home for fashion reasons only. Although Invisalign does offer clear orthodontic care without the will need for wires, most [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Tips For Parents Who Have Kids In Braces

Baby Juice Bottles

Mark Mutschler — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 09:11:55 +0000

Parents who come into my Portland, Oregon pediatric dental practice often tell me, “My baby loves juice and I just cannot take it away, so I water it down.” These parents love their babies and want them to have all the good things in life. Juice is sweet and delicious and healthy too. Right? Fruit [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Baby Juice Bottles

How Braces Move Teeth

Mark Mutschler — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 13:18:20 +0000

Kids that suck their thumbs often have buck-teeth. Why? A girl from Gladstone, Oregon asked me why her front teeth stuck out so far. She was a first grader who found it very hard to stop being a thumb sucker. Teeth are connected to jaw bones by thousands of tiny fibers that surround the roots and [...]

Post from: Great Grins

How Braces Move Teeth

Expanding Your Palate

Mark Mutschler — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:38:37 +0000

If you are an artist, your palatte may be very messy and colorful. If you are a gourmand, then your palate describes your appreciation of smell and taste. Anatomically, your palate as the roof of your mouth. Some people have a narrow palate for a variety of reasons: thumbsucking pacificer use low tongue posture birth [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Expanding Your Palate

Treating Portland Pulps & Root Canals

Mark Mutschler — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 00:05:35 +0000

“Root canal? Ouch!” That is what most of my Portland patients tell me, but luckily root canal treatments take away toothaches to make you feel better. Usually dentists prefer to treat infected root canal pulps before they start to hurt because this is the most comfortable way to go. Waiting for a tooth to hurt [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Treating Portland Pulps & Root Canals

Gum Infections in Portland

Mark Mutschler — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 20:59:21 +0000

A four year old boy from Portland came in with his mother, complaining of swelling around his baby molar. When I looked at it, I noticed that there was an infection around the last molar, next to where the permanent tooth develops. Since it could be either an infection of the tooth that spread to [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Gum Infections in Portland

Flossing Braces

Mark Mutschler — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 22:48:53 +0000

Keeping braces clean is so important to moving teeth that it bears repeating. Keeping braces clean is so important to moving teeth. Why is it important you ask? To completely correct a badly positioned tooth, the tooth must slide the brace along the wire in the brace only a few millimeters. That is NOT very [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Flossing Braces

Tears & Fears

Mark Mutschler — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 04:59:34 +0000

As a pediatric dentist, I specialize in children and special needs patients. Nevertheless, a large part of my job is overcoming parental fears. Parents have an incredible influence on their children; both positively and negatively. Kids are so tuned into parental non-verbal communication that even if a mother does not say anything negative about an [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Tears & Fears

When to Start Braces

Mark Mutschler — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 18:34:54 +0000

Many parents comment on the number of kids in second or third grade who have some braces. Treating with two phases of orthodontic care can usually be avoided. Good evidence exists that most orthodontic treatment is best provided at one time as a pre-teen. However, there ARE times when early orthodontic treatment is useful. Orthodontic [...]

Post from: Great Grins

When to Start Braces

Molar Sealants

Mark Mutschler — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 18:49:03 +0000

Permanent molars usually have very deep pits, grooves, and fissures on the biting surface. These holes can be very difficult to keep clean so they are the most common place to get cavities. In the 1970′s dentists started cleaning out these pits and fissures then squirting runny plastic into the cleaned out grooves to keep [...]

Post from: Great Grins

Molar Sealants