When discussing health with your patients, be sure to encourage them to use moderation when it comes to weight loss. Too many people tend to make great sacrifices to lose a couple pounds and become a skinnier version of themselves affecting their dental health in the process.

As medical professionals it’s our job to inform our patients about how their diet might also be affecting their dental health in their quest to lose weight. Dentists and dental hygienists tend to do a very good job when it comes to reminding patients about the regular hygienic maintenance their teeth needs. And if a patient casually mentions they are dieting then it’s crucial for dental professionals to warn about the harm certain diets can do too.

The dangers of juicing and milkshakes for patients

In today’s culture, we’re seeing a lot of diets that use juicing, or juice blends as an alternative to balanced meals. In addition, many people are drinking “healthy” milkshakes in order to control how much and what they eat. Juicing tends to have very detrimental effects on teeth, and may even give soda a run for its money when it comes to being a cause for bacteria.

Milkshakes too have high doses of sugar, which make them extremely welcoming to decay causing bacteria and plaque. Sugar levels aside, fruit juices and blends are also often highly acidic, making them even more dangerous to dental health.

Encourage patients to brush their teeth within half an hour after consuming a juice cleanse shake,or a weight loss milkshake in order to get rid of the bacteria and plaque eating away at their teeth.

Why meal replacements can lead to poor dental hygiene

Dieting patients will likely be looking to meal replacement plans to shed pounds. Meal replacement diets face the same problems with nutrition that juicing and milkshakes do, in that they have high levels of sugar and low levels of fat.

Tell your patients: a way to ensure that they won’t require a lot of extra visits to your office when using a meal replacement diet is to keep up with regular hygiene. Apart from that, encourage them to prepare their own meals rather than use the store-bought replacements. This will allow them to keep better track of what they’re consuming and how it may affect their dental and physical health.

The acidity of raw rood diets

Some patients may believe that consuming only raw foods, like fruits and vegetables, is a way to shed weight and stay healthy. It’s important they be informed about the high levels of sugar and acidity in fruits and vegetables that may cause them harm. In moderation and with healthy hygiene habits, the acidity in fruit and vegetables may not have much of an effect. When those sugars and acids are all they are being subject to, teeth may suffer.

Encourage healthy habits

Keep in mind that you should always encourage your patients to live a healthy lifestyle, and dieting isn’t necessarily a bad thing when done correctly. If it comes up, inform patients about how a combination of diet and exercise is the healthiest way to lose weight, without sacrificing their nutritional needs and their dental health. Stress to your patients the importance of staying informed when it comes to sugar levels, and acidity of their food.