How Thumb-Sucking Negatively Impacts Your Children’s Oral Health
When a child is young, it is almost a natural reaction for them to suck their thumb, and many children actually start doing it when they are in the womb. Problems usually only arise when they prolong their thumb sucking past infancy. It is then that their oral health issues will start to appear.
According to the British Orthodontic Society, if your child stops thumb sucking by the age of seven, then their teeth will often correct themselves through normal growth. However, evidence shows that one in every eight children between seven and eleven years old have a lingering thumb-sucking habit. If their habit continues after the age of seven, then the position of their adult teeth that are getting ready to come in can be permanently affected and self-correction is less likely to occur. This is why it is so important to get your child off the thumb-sucking train at an early age.
The impact thumb-sucking has on your child’s oral health if it doesn’t stop by the age of seven can be severe and long-term. Some problems that could arise include crossbite, a misshapen palette, an anterior open bite, and even difficulty chewing food. The U.S. National Institute of Health discovered that anterior open bite and posterior cross bite are two of the most frequent malocclusions associated with prolonged sucking habits. Iranian experts have also found that thumb-sucking can lead to speech impairment, irregularities in teeth, malocclusion, and intra-oral ulcers. Below are some tips on how to help your child break their thumb-sucking habit.
Tips to Help Your Child Break Their Thumb-Sucking Habit
- Praise them for not sucking their thumb.
- Children often suck their thumb when they are feeling insecure or are uncomfortable. Focus on correcting the cause of the anxiety and provide comfort to your child.
- For an older child who is still sucking their thumb, involve them in choosing the method of stopping.
- Your dentist can offer encouragement and explain to your child what could happen to their teeth if they don’t stop.
- You can try bandaging or putting a sock over their thumb at night as a reminder to not do it.
- Your dentist or pediatrician can also prescribe a bitter medication to coat the thumb or a mouth appliance in efforts to try to get them to stop.
Why Good Oral Health is so Important for Young Children
The Oral Health Foundation has researched and discovered that over half of adults have said that they took their oral health for granted when they were younger. This highlights the importance of teaching our children how and why it is important to maintain a healthy mouth. By instilling good oral health in children at a young age, you can set them up for a healthy smile for life!
If your child is thumb-sucking and you are worried about the aftermath of this issue, call us at 215-372-8332 to schedule an appointment to talk with your dentist about it. They might be able to give you advice or a remedy to try and get them to stop thumb-sucking.
