Avoid These 5 Situations In Order To Keep Your Dental Crown In Great Shape

If you have a dental crown, you need to be aware of the situations that can cause your crown to fall off. Although permanent crowns should stay in place forever, certain situations can cause your crown to pop off. In order to ensure that your crown doesn't fall off, make sure that you don't put your teeth in any of the following situations.

Eating Sticky Foods

If you have a dental crown, you need to avoid eating sticky foods, or at least avoid chewing sticky foods on the side of your mouth where your crown is located. That means you need to say goodbye to chewing taffy, gum, and chewy candies with your whole mouth. If you can't avoid chewy foods, try to keep them away from your crown by chewing them with only one side of your mouth. 

Even after having your crown in place for years, this is still good advice to follow. Having a crown is not the same thing as having a permanent tooth; it is held in place by a strong cement glue; but sticky foods have the power to pull it out of place.

Eating Hard Foods

You should also avoid eating foods that are particularly tough when you have a crown, or at least chew them with your other teeth. Continually exposing your tooth with a crown to hard foods can wear it down and can wear down the cement holding it in place. So be careful when you eat nuts and other tough and hard foods. 

Grinding Your Teeth

Grinding your teeth can have a whole host of negative consequences; when you grind your teeth, you exert more pressure on your teeth than they are meant to withstand. Prolonged grinding of your teeth can chip your crown. It can also cause your crown to fall out; all that extra pressure will wear down the cement holding your crown in place. 

If you grind your teeth when you sleep, you can protect your teeth and your dental crowns by wearing a mouth guard.

Using Your Teeth As A Tool

Another way to compromise your crown is by using your teeth as a tool. In general, you should not use your teeth as a tool; however, this concept becomes even more important when you have a crown, since it is not a permanent tooth. 

Don't use your teeth to open up packages or containers. Ask someone for help if you need assistance. it is not worth damaging your expensive crown just to get something open. 

​Neglecting Your Teeth

Finally, you need to make sure that you don't neglect your teeth. You need to brush your teeth two to three times a day and floss your teeth on a daily basis. Poor oral hygiene can cause you to develop a cavity under your crown; this will compromise the integrity of your crown and could even cause it to fall out.

If you avoid the situations listed above, your crown should stay in place without needing to be cemented or fixed again for many years. Avoiding the situations listed above will help you protect the investment you made in your mouth.