What are the mechanisms for erosive tooth wear?
Erosion is the loss or wear of dental hard tissue by acids not caused by bacteria. Erosion may be caused by intrinsic (e.g., acid reflux and excessive vomiting) and/or extrinsic (e.g., diet) factors. Soft drinks, particularly carbonated sodas and sports drinks, appear to be a significant extrinsic cause of erosion.
How is attrition of teeth treated?
Depending on the cause of dental attrition, there are various treatment options. Most commonly, dental attrition treatment will involve a combination of orthodontic treatment to fix tooth alignment (e.g. Invisalign), dental restorations to fix damaged teeth, and treatment for bruxism (e.g. wearing a night guard).
What is normal dental attrition?
Normal attrition is slow tooth wear associated with chewing, and there is faster dental wear related to sleep disorders like sleep bruxism. Sleep Bruxism causes dental attrition from the lateral motion of the teeth. We also find tooth-to-tooth wear when natural teeth are opposing porcelain crowns.
What does tooth erosion mean?
Dental erosion is the loss of the surface of your teeth due to acids you eat or drink, or acids coming up from your stomach. These acids can dissolve the crystals that make up your teeth, leading to tooth surface loss.
Can dentist fix erosion?
If you’ve experienced significant enamel erosion, a dentist can help you with a few techniques. The first is called tooth bonding. Bonding is a procedure in which a tooth-colored material known as resin is applied to stained or damaged teeth. The resin can cover up discolorations and protect your tooth.
What does tooth abrasion look like?
Tooth wear from abrasion typically looks like a wedge or V-shaped indentation of the tooth at the gum margin, and it appears worn, shiny and is often discolored at the cervical margin.
What is the difference between Abfraction and attrition?
Tooth wear is the result of three processes: abrasion (wear produced by interaction between teeth and other materials), attrition (wear through tooth-tooth contact) and erosion (dissolution of hard tissue by acidic substances).
Can you fix tooth erosion?
Unfortunately, there’s no way to “restore” tooth enamel. Enamel doesn’t have living cells, which means there is no way it can repair itself. Any damage done to the enamel on your teeth is permanent. However, while you cannot replace eroded tooth enamel, there are ways you can treat the damaged area.
What causes normal tooth wear and dental attrition?
Normal attrition is slow tooth wear associated with chewing, and there is faster dental wear related to sleep disorders like sleep bruxism. Sleep Bruxism causes dental attrition from the lateral motion of the teeth. We also find tooth-to-tooth wear when natural teeth are opposing porcelain crowns. There have been several articles on this topic.
Why is there no data on Tooth wear?
Classifications made so far have no accurate pre- valence data because the indexes do not necessarily measure a specific etiology, or because the study populations can be diverse in age and characteristics. Tooth wears (attrition, erosion and abrasion) is perceived internationally as a growing problem.
How is attrition similar to all four types of abrasion?
Like all four types of abrasion, attrition occurs slowly over the years. However, in some people tooth wear occurs faster instead the attrition is more pronounced. This is due to the fact that several forms of abrasion combine, and the enamel becomes more prone to attrition.
How is the tooth wear index ( TWI ) created?
Smith and Knight (16) took Eccles’ ideas a stage further, producing the tooth wear index (TWI), a comprehensive system whereby all four visible surfaces (buccal, cervi- cal, lingual and occlusal–incisal) of all teeth present are scored for wear, irrespective of how it occurred (Table 1).