Dental News

Are Sweet Snacks at the Office Ruining Your Oral Health?

June 3, 2016

Dental experts warn “cake culture” is fueling an epidemic of tooth decay and obesity.

Are Sweet Snacks at the Office Ruining Your Oral Health?

Does someone seem to bring cake, cookies, or donuts to your workplace just about every day? Do you find yourself sneaking more and more snacks because of it?

Your oral health—and your overall health—may be suffering as a result of this “cake culture” in the workplace, warn experts from the Faculty of Dental Surgery at the UK’s Royal College of Surgeons.

Here’s why cake culture is such a problem:

You eat more sugar that you really want: Most people find it hard to resist a sweet treat, especially if it is being offered as a reward from a boss to their employees, as a gift from one employee to the others, or as a general perk of the workplace. It almost seems rude to refuse to indulge! The temptations of sugary snacks can lure people into breaking their own goals for healthy eating. And if you eat too much sugar, this will impact your health. The empty calories from sugar can contribute to obesity and related health problems, including diabetes. Eating or drinking sugary stuff can also lead to problems with your teeth, since the bacteria that cause gum disease and tooth decay love to eat sugar too. If you are diabetic or prediabetic, having an extra cookie or donut at work can be especially detrimental to your oral health because your poor blood sugar control will make you more vulnerable to gum disease infections.

You eat sugar outside of mealtimes: When it comes to your oral health, it’s not really the quantity of sugar you consume so much as how often you eat it that matters. This is because every snack is like a fresh feeding for the bacteria that cause tooth decay. If you follow up your lunch with a cookie, you’re not really giving them much extra food debris to snack on. But if you snatch a cookie from the break room an hour or two after lunch, you’re adding extra fuel to the tooth decay process.

So How Can You Protect Your Health From Cake Culture?

Ideally, we need to have a cultural shift away from sugary treats to healthier options. But of course that isn’t going to happen overnight. So in the meantime, you can at least try to enjoy cake culture in moderation. Limit the number and size of your servings to help prevent weight gain. Brush your teeth or at least rinse your mouth out with water soon after eating to protect your teeth.

If you’re worried about the impact of past indulgences on your teeth, schedule an appointment for a dental cleaning & exam at California Dental Group now. Our caring dentists will be on the alert for any signs of tooth decay or gum disease and advise you of your options for treatment.

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