Children's Dental Disease And The Domino Effect

Poor oral health , dental disease , and tooth pain can put children at a serious disadvantage in school according to a new study in the American Journal of Public Health . The study examined nearly 1,500 socioeconomically disadvantaged elementary and high school children in the Los Angeles School District , matching their oral health status to their academic achievement and attendance records. The study found that children who reported having recent tooth pain were 4 times more likely to have a lower grade point average when compared to children without oral pain . Also poor oral health seem to cause more absences from school for children and more missed work for their parents .

Baby Teeth Have New Role

A team of San Antonio scientists at the University of Texas Health Science Center found in the baby teeth of otherwise healthy children and analyzed their enviornmental past exposure to medicines , pesticides and other chemicals as well as the presence of fatty acids thought to protect against damage from these enviormental toxins. The theory of potential links between autism and enviornmental toxic exposure being higher in autistic children than compared toi healthy children . Nobody knows what enviorment and what genes contribute to autism , so the next big step in finding out what people have been exposed to during the critical periods of child development . According to scientists , the advantages of looking for early exposure in baby teeth are many ; they're plentiful , and there's lots of research showing exactly when and how each tooth is fromed , both in the womb and in the first months after birth . So the prescence of a toxin in a certain tooth or part of tooth can point to the point at which the exposure occured and link the development of autism in that child's development.