General and Preventive Dentistry
Periodontal Therapy • Endodontics • Orthodontics
Preventive Care Services • Pediatric Dental Services • Dental Sealants
Mouth Guards • TMJ Syndrome • Neuromuscular Dentistry
Trauma Dentistry • Sedation Dentistry • Oral Cancer Screening
Fresh Breath Center • Snoring and Sleep Apnea Treatment
Periodontics
Over 75% of Americans age 35 and over have some form of gum disease, a result of poor dental hygiene and the subsequent build-up of plaque. In its earliest stage, your gums might swell and bleed easily. At its worst, you might lose your teeth. So, if you want to keep your teeth, you must take care of your gums. The good news is that gum disease is preventable in most cases. Attention to everyday oral hygiene (brushing and flossing), coupled with professional cleanings twice a year, could be all that’s needed to prevent and actually reverse the early stage of gum disease. If you have gum disease, Dr. Carter or one of our hygienists will identify it during your exam and recommend the best treatment for the level of severity.
Endodontics
Endodontics deals with diseases of the tissue, blood vessels, and nerves inside the tooth. The most common endodontic treatment is called a “root canal,” a procedure used to remove infected tissue and refill the nerve canal inside the tooth. A root canal allows you to retain your natural tooth while eliminating the infection.
Orthodontics
Orthodontics is a form of dentistry that specializes in the diagnosis, prevention and treatment of dental and facial irregularities. These problems are classified as malocclusion, which means a bad bite. Dr. Carter is skilled in the design, application and control of corrective appliances, also known as braces, to bring teeth, lips and jaws into proper alignment to achieve facial balance.
It is always less expensive to correct a problem when the patient is younger than to wait for the problem to become more serious in the future.
Benefits of early orthodontic treatment include:
• Improve profile, smile, and self-esteem
• Correct harmful habits, such as thumb sucking and tongue thrusting
• Develop the arches and make more room for the tongue
• Improved speech
• Reduction of time in fixed braces, frequently eliminating the need for extracting permanent teeth
• Increases nasal breathing, which improves health
• Eliminates airway constriction
• Creates beautiful broad smiles by developing the arches
• Eliminates grinding of teeth at night
• Prevents headaches and earaches
Adult orthodontics
You are never too old to improve your smile. Dr. Carter also treats adults for a wide variety of conditions, from overbites to underbites. Approximately 25 percent of today’s orthodontic patients are adults. Teeth can be moved at any age, and therefore more adults are proceeding with orthodontic treatment to achieve straight teeth, a beautiful, and healthy jaw joints. Many adults prefer the clear or gold braces, which are more esthetically pleasing than the standard metal braces.
No two smiles are alike, and therefore no two orthodontic treatment programs are either. Typically, active treatment times range from one to two years and vary with the degree of tooth movement and the severity of the problem.
Preventive Care Service
Early detection is the key to avoiding costly and painful dental treatment. Prevention begins with the control of plaque and calculus, the main cause of decay and periodontal disease. When caught early cavities are easy to treat and save more of the natural tooth structure allowing the tooth to maintain its natural strength and integrity. The major cause of tooth loss in adults is periodontal disease, which is known as the silent killer of teeth because most patients feel no symptoms until it’s too late. With regular dental visits, we can treat gum disease at an early stage, before it gets out of hand. Dr. Carter and his staff provide their patients with the information and education they need to be active participants in keeping their smiles healthy.
Dental Services for Children
We advise that you bring your child in between 24 and 36 months of age for their first dental visit. The examination will make sure that their teeth are healthy and that, as parents, you have the best information about oral hygiene and diet to prevent tooth decay. For older children, we provide a dental examination, tooth cleaning, fluoride treatment, and x-rays when needed.
Please be assured that our dental staff is very experienced with young patients, and we will always do our best to calm their fears, make them feel comfortable and give them a pleasant dental experience.
Dental Sealants
Thanks to fluoride, dental sealants and better dental habits, fifty percent of school-age children now have no cavities. Dr. Carter provides quality, effective dental sealants for your children’s teeth that will protect them from the normal causes of cavities.
Mouth Guards
Mouth guards are often used to protect your child’s teeth from injury due to teeth grinding and during sports. The guard usually covers the upper teeth; however, if your child wears braces or another fixed dental appliance on his lower jaw, Dr. Carter may suggest a mouth protector for these teeth, too.
TMJ Treatment
Jaw Pain (TMJ problems and cures)
Do you have headaches; neck aches, clicking jaws, limited opening range of the jaw or ringing in the ears? It may be TMJ Syndrome. Some 60 million Americans have TMJ. Simply put, TMJ is the syndrome that happens when the muscles in the jaw and the temporomandibular joint are out of alignment or misaligned, causing problems when chewing. In simple terms, the ligaments, muscles, bones and joints do not line up, thereby causing pain.
Symptoms of TMJ
• Clicking, popping or grating sound when opening or closing the mouth
• Headaches and/or dizziness
• Tenderness in jaw muscles
• Earache
• Jaws that sometimes lock open when yawning or if mouth is held open
• Spasm or cramps in the jaw area
Talk to us if you want to stop jaw and headache pain before it starts. Our treatment includes no pills, no shots, no surgery, and no side effects. We can treat these problems because they are most likely caused by clenching your teeth when you’re sleeping and occasionally throughout the day. When you clench your teeth you use some of the strongest muscles in your body that can cause morning and tension headaches, and even damage surrounding joints, teeth, and other muscles.
The high-intensity contractions of these powerful muscles become painful and the forces generated cause pain in surrounding tissues, joints, and other muscles. By reducing the intensity of the clenching, you’re effectively minimizing the source of the pain. Depending on the severity of your TMJ Dr. Carter may choose to refer you to a TMJ specialist.
Neuromuscular Dentistry
Traditional concepts of achieving pain-free oral and ‘natural’ function will center on the mouth and teeth. Neuromuscular dentistry combines our knowledge of the functional aspects of the mouth and teeth with jaw, oral and facial muscle healing and harmonizing therapies.
TMJ problems are often attributed to how the jaw joints function in relationship to the teeth. As we have seen, neuromuscular dentistry is a different and more successful way to treat this type of problem.
The Neuromuscular Difference
Rehabilitating teeth can improve the feel and function of your smile; however, building up or restoring teeth might only help to revert the jaw back to a habitual position, which is not the proper position. Therefore, relief from pain can be short lived. Neuromuscular dentistry is focused on returning your oral function to a proper position that is comfortable for the long-term. The following information will give you insights into this potentially life-changing treatment.
Comprehensive Treatment Planning
The challenge of modern dentistry is to create lasting, natural looking and feeling smiles. This challenge results from the need to give someone a comprehensive solution, when they only expect small ‘repairs’ to be done.
It is similar to only making patches to a deteriorated foundation of a building, rather than complete restoration. Traditional dentistry is usually focused on fixing localized problems. This type of treatment only extends the likelihood of dentures or significant crowning of teeth. These ‘minimal repairs’ are not long-term solutions for achieving pain freedom or preserving natural teeth, which are the kind of results our clients now expect.
Dr. Carter believes that neuromuscular dentistry is part of a comprehensive assessment of oral health. It prepares the foundation of your smile for the additional benefits of modern restorative and esthetic solutions. Comprehensive treatment planning is an investment in the long-term future of your smile and remaining natural tooth structure. While not everyone will choose this level of care, we feel our clients deserve this comprehensive option.
Trauma Dentistry
Accidental damage to teeth creates the need for reconstruction and restorative procedures to repair the health and beauty of your mouth. A damaged tooth, if treated quickly can many times be “saved” with minimally invasive cosmetic dental procedures. If a tooth is lost and not replaced it can cause your other teeth to shift, throwing your bite off. This can lead to breakage of other teeth and restorations, headaches, jaw pain and TMJ Disorder. Our wide range of cosmetic dental procedures provides options for you that suit the scope of your dental problem and financial concerns.
Fresh Breath Center
Bad breath (halitosis) is a common problem, which often comes from the activity of bacteria in the mouth. Although there is no way of knowing for sure, most adults probably suffer from bad breath occasionally, with perhaps a quarter suffering from it on a regular basis.
There are two types of bad breath. Transitory, or occasional, bad breath is caused by foods like garlic and onions and generally only lasts from 24 to 72 hours. It might be referred to as “morning breath,” which goes away after you brush your teeth.
The odor of chronic bad breath results when bacteria in the mouth and on the tongue cause the formation of volatile sulfur compounds (VSC’s) in the form of hydrogen sulfides. The back of the tongue is the prime breeding spot for anaerobic bacteria that creates odor-causing Volatile Sulfur Compounds. This may be an ongoing problem requiring professional breath management.
Let us know if you are having an issue with bad breath. We may have a treatment that fights both the cause and effect of bad breath.
Sedation Dentistry
Sedation dentistry can help take the fear and anxiety out of going to the dentist. Dr. Carter is specially trained in sedation dentistry techniques that can help you to relax while you receive the dental care that you need.
Sedation helps you relax to the point where you are virtually unaware of your treatment. You wake gently at the end of your procedure with very little memory of what occurred. Sedation dentistry can help Dr. Carter complete multiple long procedures-even years’ worth of dental work-in just one appointment. For people who have avoided dental treatment for many years, sedation dentistry can provide the opportunity to at last receive the care they need.
A wide variety of procedures can be accomplished with sedation dentistry. Dr. Carter can place crowns, veneers, or dentures while you are sedated. He can also treat your gums or whiten your teeth. All of this can be accomplished without any discomfort at all, thanks to sedation dentistry.
If you are nervous about having dental work done, contact Dr. Carter to learn how sedation dentistry can help you. Whether you have pain or aesthetic concerns, sedation dentistry may be the answer you’ve been waiting for.
Who Is A Candidate?
People who have . . .
-high fear
-traumatic dental experiences
-difficulty getting numb
-a bad gag reflex
-very sensitive teeth
-complex dental problems
-limited time to complete dental care
People who . . .
-hate needles and shots!
-hate the noises, smells and tastes associated with dental care
-are afraid or embarrassed about their teeth
Oral Cancer Screening
In this year alone approximately 35,000 people in the US will be diagnosed with oral cancer. When found early oral cancer has a very high survival rate, unfortunately most oral cancer is found as late stage cancer.
Oral cancer screening is a routine part of a dental examination. Regular check-ups, including an examination of the entire mouth, are essential in the early detection of cancerous and pre-cancerous conditions. You may have a very small, but dangerous, oral spot or sore and not be aware of it.
Snoring and Sleep Apnea Treatment
Are you falling asleep during the day even though you thought you got a full night sleep? You may have a common disorder known as sleep apnea. With sleep apnea, as you are sleeping you may have one or more pauses in breathing or shallow breaths. Breathing pauses can last from a few seconds to minutes. They often occur 5 to 30 times or more an hour. Typically, normal breathing then starts again, sometimes with a loud snort or choking sound.
Sleep apnea usually is a chronic (ongoing) condition that disrupts your sleep 3 or more nights each week. You often move out of deep sleep and into light sleep when your breathing pauses or becomes shallow. This results in poor sleep quality that makes you tired during the day. Sleep apnea is one of the leading causes of excessive daytime sleepiness. Because of the increased daytime sleepiness you are at a greater risk for occupational and automobile accidents. Untreated sleep apnea also leaves you at greater risk for developing heart, blood pressure, stroke, diabetes or other serious health problems.
In the past the recommended treatment for sleep apnea was the CPAP machine, but many patients found it cumbersome and uncomfortable to use and abandoned it.
Dental technology now allows us to offer patients suffering from sleep apnea a comfortable, but highly effective treatment. Rather then a noisy, claustrophobic machine we are able to treat sleep apnea and snoring with a comfortable, custom fitted oral appliance. The SomnoMed Oral Appliance holds the lower jaw slightly forward, which tightens the soft tissue and muscles of the upper airway. This allows the airway to stay open and unobstructed so it does not impair your breathing.
If you are a loved ones suffer from sleep apnea, don’t lose another nights sleep!
Call today and find out how Dr. Carter can help you get the restful sleep your body needs.
