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Dental caries and other oral disorders diminish the quality of life of the human beings by undermining their self-esteem and by interfering with their vital functions, such as breathing, eating, swallowing and speaking. Oral health ought to be therefore an essential part of overall general health.
Children represent perhaps the most challenging group of patients in preventive dental practice. The pediatric dentist must know about the development of teeth and jaws as well as about the psychological and emotional maturation of a child. This knowledge is the key to good communication with children in a manner understandable for them.
What is the aim of pediatric dentistry? Generally we can answer that it is almost the same like in adults’ dentistry but it should respect all above mentioned developmental characteristics.
The main goal of pediatric dentistry is the prevention of dental caries in infants, toddlers and preschool children called Early Childhood Caries [ECC]. There is only one effective weapon against this widespread disease: early start of oral hygiene. And this task cannot be successful without a very important factor – cooperation with the parents.
Healthy teeth and gums are really a gift from nature and with proper care, correct nutrition and parental support, they can remain healthy.
Dental treatment and sometimes even dental examination represent huge stress for children, with which sometimes they are not able to cope. Dental fear and dental anxiety, sometimes even leading to „odontophobia“ are very frequent difficulties faced by pediatric stomatologists. We call them Behavioural Management Problems ( BMP)
BMP are normal in very small children [up to 4 years of age] but in schoolchildren they become an unpleasant obstruction to proper dental care. We use a wide scale of psychotherapeutic techniques to prevent BMP but often without success.
In totally uncooperative children we then use the so-called conscious analgesic-sedation technique which enables the dental examination and treatment of such anxious children.
At the Pediatric Dental Office of UNICARE Medical Center we can offer the very experienced services of a pediatric stomatologist working under conscious analgesic-sedation in collaboration with a Pediatric Intensive care specialist (see above).
Our dental services for children include preventive procedures, conservative treatment of deciduous as well as permanent teeth, interceptive orthodontic diagnosis [i.e. early diagnosis of teeth malpositions and anomalies of jaws], treatment of dental injuries, procedures of pediatric prosthodontics, treatment of diseases of gums and juvenile periodontitis, diagnostics and treatment of diseases of oral mucous membranes, surgical treatment of delayed eruption of teeth or malpositions of labial or sublingual frenulum, extraction of teeth and other essential clinical and surgical dental procedures in children and adolescents.
The Dental department of Unicare Medical Center also provides comprehensive, modern preventive and curative and prosthetic dental treatment to the parents of our young patients and other members of their families. Parents are encouraged to accept all modern oral health care practices in order to become models of the best oral hygiene habits for their children.
Assoc. Prof.., Dr. Jan Handzel, Ph.D., Paediatric Dentist
Unicare Medical Center
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