One of the things we try to do for our teeth from the day we are born to the day we die in London is to avoid decay and it is a never ending battle, day in, day out. Tooth decay starts with plaque, as does every problem in the mouth. It begins by bacteria being allowed to form on the surface of the teeth due to poor oral hygiene, and soon, plaque will set in and develops acids which eat away at the teeth’s enamel.

The first sign of any damage being done will come in the form of a shooting pain when the tooth is exposed to hot and cold temperatures or when bitten down on. At this point, your dentist can offer you a filling to solve the problem, but if left to its own devices, the plaque will get inside the tooth and infect the pulp roots and nerves, which will require a root canal to clear out the infection.

Ignore this, and you will start to lose teeth. Good oral hygiene and regular dental check-ups can nip these issues in the bud before they get serious. On the market today, there are toothbrushes, toothpastes and mouth-washes specifically aimed at the fight on plaque and designed to remove it whenever possible. You can even purchase a dye that when applied to the teeth, highlights anywhere that plaque is present so that you can target it with your brush. The threat of tooth decay is ever present, but there are more ways to fight it than ever before.

Tooth loss can be a very difficult time in London: first of all there is the shock of losing the tooth to get over and then just how you are going to replace it and what with. Mini-implants were only ever used at first to make way for their bigger siblings, but it was soon recognised that they had a use in their own right.

For starters they are dead easy to fit into the mouth, in fact, you can have a whole mouthful fitted in a day- they are simply placed by precision laser key hole surgery that does very little damage to the surrounding tissue, hence making healing faster.

They are very strong and pretty much in for life once they are in and have some great uses: if the is some bone deficiency in the jaw, they are much more preferred than a full implant and can be used almost immediately when fitted; they are good for housing smaller incisors where there is less pressure on the teeth. But possibly, the most popular use of the mini implant is to help anchor fittings into the mouth- again, good with small crowns but they can also be used to secure a dental bridge. Yet they truly come into their own when used in conjunction with dentures: 5-7 are fitted into the jaws for each denture (that then has to be modified). Once ready, the denture simply clicks into position over the implants and it keeps them true and strong in the mouth than they ever were before.

So what is a Lava crown I hear you cry people of the city of London? Well, a lot of crowns are made from porcelain, however, a crown needs to be strong too so they cover a metal base. Strong yes, but the metal tends to stop that pure hue and translucence that pure porcelain gives of; not so with the Lava crown.

This crown is a precision milled fitting made from a zirconium framework and covered in layers of veneer ceramics, making it fracture resistant and as strong as metal based crowns, yet more natural looking than nature itself with up to 8 shades available for the zirconium frame and up to 16 for the veneer layers.

But it really comes into its own when used in the manufacture of dental bridges and being so strong, it can be used be used to spread over the loss of 3-4 teeth and then bonded onto the teeth that remain making them fit in not only aesthetically, but making them biocompatible too with the rest of the teeth.The one other redeeming feature about this fitting is that it eliminates they grey around the gums caused by metal based crown. Oh yes, Lava is all about the look!

There is no doubt that dentures have come a long, long way in London and if you needed further proof, just take a look at the Valplast denture. It is a partial denture that works around the teeth that are left in the mouth; made from a flexible material, it is custom built from prints of your mouth and colour coded exactly to fit right in with the rest of your mouth and teeth.

It doesn’t come with any clumsy looking metal clasps either, the straps, again, are made from a flexible, almost invisible plastic that wrap around the teeth. Because the device is strong (it comes with a lifetime guarantee) yet flexible, it affords a lot of comfort to the wearer; It is placed in warm water first thing in the morning so that it softens and can easily be placed and moulded into the mouth for a stunning fit- it moves with your mouth and adapts to the space it is in.

It can be more expensive than other dentures, but then you get what you pay for with this device- discretion, strength and total comfort and it sits true, firmly and natural and it is far, far cheaper than having a dental implant or a bridge fitted.

If you consider yourself to have pretty ship-shape teeth in London, then all you may need to put the icing on the cake is a little teeth whitening, and to be honest, there has never been a better time to do it, nor better products to do it with either. If you are in a bit of a rush, maybe have an event coming up and you need to look your best, laser whitening can get smiling again superbly within the hour: sit in the chair and let your dentist cover your teeth with a gel, then once your gums and lips have been protected, you get your first zapping.

The process is then repeated a couple of more times until you get the level of whiteness you require and then you walk out of there looking like a star. Some companies offer this treatment at home too. Of course, there are more gentle, more relaxed ways- DIY bleaching kits are in vogue right now as you can also do it at home, at your own pace to get the results you want and they aren’t that expensive either. But if you take a look in the shops at some of the amazing array of products on sale, you can find even easier ways to whiten your teeth- there are brushes, pens and touch-up sticks.

But consider this as well, you clean your teeth at least twice a day, so why not combine that with bleaching at the time. Whitening toothpastes have also grown in popularity because they are subtle and gentle in the way they work and you will notice a staggering difference after only a few weeks.

The treatment of excessive tooth decay by root canal has never been good reading in the city of London, in fact it has thrown up some very bad urban legends as well. It is by its very nature a tricky little treatment and sometimes in the past, a bit grotesque too. It all starts with you allowing your teeth to get into a state and the onset of tooth decay: acids and bacteria have been allowed to eat away at the enamel and have broken through to the inside of the tooth infecting the pulp and the roots.

The only chance you have to save the tooth is to remove the infected pulp and remove the roots by drilling them out- tricky situations could involve the cutting of the gums and coming in from the side of the tooth in order get to them. Once all of this has been done, the tooth would be filled and then royally crowned. The bad press that came from this treatment was that it could be very painful because of the use of a physical drill, that sometimes couldn’t remove all of the root, hence the side entry scenario. But procedures like root canals have been made a lot easier to do and virtually pain-free thanks to the introduction of lasers into dental surgeries.

Physical drills cause vibration and often do further damage because of it. It can also affect the nerves in the gums around the root causing the pain. A laser however, burns it way forward removing the pulp and the roots without any vibration at all making it one of the most pain-free, routine treatments around; in a sense, having a root canal has almost become a joyous affair!

So, you’ve let your mouth go have you? Not feeling like smiling much these days? Well, this is the perfect time for you to get a smile make-over! No matter how bad you think your smile has become, these dashing London dentists have got the answers to get you grinning again.

First, you need to ensure that you have a full set of teeth and if not, plug the gaps with a bridge or an implant, then with a full quota, you can begin in earnest. Some annoying people happen to have kept their teeth together, albeit, they may have discoloured a bit; for these people, they can rejuvenate their smile by whitening their teeth through toothpastes, bleaching kits or laser treatments. If the teeth have become cracked or chipped, even worn, veneers or bonding can cover up these sins. Of course, the health of the mouth is important too so before any of this can take place, you need to ensure you are free gum disease and that your bite is true- this may require the placement of crowns and teeth straightening; it will not only promote a healthy look, but also help to protect any new work you are having done.

Old, unsightly grey fillings can also be replaced with white composite ones for a more natural aura. Now with your smile complete and you’re looking years younger, there is also one final thing to consider- your lips, for they crown your teeth, but they too can over time become wrinkled and jaded and can ruin the good work you have just had done inside your mouth. Help is at hand here too in the form of dermal fillers and Bot-ox. These treatments will reduce dramatically the ageing process around the mouth.

There is never a good time to have bad breath, but in a ‘get-ahead, dog-eat-dog’ place like London, you need to be at your best at all times and bad breath is going to hold you back. But forgetting about the rat-race, bad breath is also an indication that you, your mouth and your body are starting to have problems and that things are going wrong.

The body is complex and it depends on everything working in unison and it needs fuel too, so it is imperative to keep up a good diet in order to maintain your immune system; everything needs to be in working order, including your mouth. Bad breath can be caused by many things, a poor immune system to start with. On most levels, it comes down to poor oral hygiene and can indicate gum disease and tooth decay- this needs to change in order to fight the problem- habits, as well as diet, need to be addressed in order to give your mouth a chance; you should liaison closely with your dentist and work out a plan between you.

Having a dry mouth can lead to bad breath; lack of saliva leaves the mouth defenceless in the face of bacteria and disease so it is imperative that the mouth is kept hydrated at all times by whatever methods are needed. If after all these issues have been addressed yet the problem remains, this implies more serious issues going on in your body. You will need to seek advice from your doctor and run a few tests in order to get to the root of the problem. Bad breath is a real problem with real issues.

Gum disease in London is evil: make no mistake about how dangerous this condition is because not only does it wreak havoc in your mouth, it can cause damage throughout your body too.Gum disease is a direct result of poor oral hygiene, that and avoiding the dentist. The idea behind oral hygiene is to prevent plaque from developing in the mouth as this is where every other problem in the mouth stems from, gum disease included.

If not removed, the plaque will turn to tartar that build up around the base of the teeth and infects the gums, meanwhile, tooth decay can develop that will also lead to gum disease; this will cause the gums to ‘die’ leading to inevitable tooth loss. But whilst all of this is going on, the gums disease, that is quite poisonous, will be leaking toxins into the bloodstream and over a prolonged period, poison the heart and other organs, causing them to fail.

You will fist become aware of gum disease when you gums ‘weep’ or bleed after brushing and it is now you should jump into action as soon as this occurs. Between you and your dentist, you should clean your teeth and gums and ‘up’ the way you look after your mouth, this will include improving your diet, your oral hygiene and cutting down on the smoking and drinking. Herbal products are excellent in the fight against gum disease so you should find out as much as you can about the way they work. Of course, if the problem has been allowed to go beyond this point, rectifying it becomes complex. Cleaning the teeth and gums is an intricate procedure but necessary in order to remove any disease and bacteria. Serious cases may require bone grafting and gum contouring in order to save your teeth.

The city of London is a complex place to live: for all its glitz and glamour and the fun to be had, it can also be a very hectic and stressful place, and being expensive only adds to the stress. Stress shows itself in many ways, normally when you have taken too much of it, but it can also manifest itself in the form of teeth grinding.

Again, you won’t immediately notice it at first, but unchecked, it can cause untold damage to your teeth, jaws and upper body. The causes of it are the build-up of stresses throughout the day and that are not dissipated before you go to bed, meaning a high chance of you grinding your teeth during sleep. The initial damage is done to the teeth and this can be remedied by the use of a mouth-guard from your dentist, but that will not stop the grinding action and the more you do it, the more pressure and hence, damage you will be doing to your jaws, damage that may require surgery to overcome in the long run. But it doesn’t stop there, prolonged grinding and pressure on the jaws can lead to headaches and tinnitus, and even more seriously, damage to the  neck and upper back that may well affect the nervous system too.

To stop this constant grinding requires you to address the causes of daytime stress though therapy and possibly, anger management in order to get to the root of the problem. The important time of the day is that when you finish work and when you go to sleep. It is imperative that you learn to use these hours to de-stress and relax- even forget about the day, only then will the grinding become controllable.