First Go

So welcome to the first blog of the new Scott Amer, pediatric dentist entering the 21st century (a decade late but getting there.)

A beautiful Saturday afternoon towards the end of January. Day before the BIG Jets-Colts game for you football fans. Go Green!! (yes I know I'm a Giants fan, but its easy to root for the Jets as opposed to being a Red Sox/Mets fan and can't even think about rooting for the Yankees.) Why does it seem that baseball rivalries are so much more intense than football or the other sports?

So going on a tangent with sports...actually had a patient come in this week who had a broken (chipped) front tooth due to an accident while playing basketball at a CYO pick-up game. The discussion with the mom was centered on the "necessity" of wearing a sports mouth guard. In New York there are laws regulating the need for young bicyclists to wear helmets to prevent unfortunate accidents. Also well documented is the need for trauma protection during skateboarding or roller blading to prevent head, wrist or knee injuries. So why is there little regulation when it comes to contact sports. Football and lacrosse mandate the use of mouth-guards, but soccer, baseball, basketball and other contact sports do not. The use of mouth-guards protect against, not only tooth injuries, but also a properly made piece will also prevent and lessen concussions. The state of Texas has as a law that all junior and senior high school athletes need to wear a mouthpiece during sports play.
As an added reminder....once a young girl came into the office as an emergency. The bleeding had stopped but her two front teeth were broken and loose. The accident had occurred during a girls lacrosse game. I was taken by this because I know there is mandated mouth-guard wear. Turns out she and a teammate were tossing the ball on the side line and she did NOT have the mouth-guard in. Sure enough she missed the ball and before the game even started was rushed to my office. WEAR the mouth-guard if you have the mouth-guard.
Just because you should brush twice a day does not mean we will blog twice a day, so that's it for now....more to come soon!!