Throughout the spring, you will cheer for your kids when they take the field for baseball and softball games. You may even play sports yourself recreationally or competitively.
If you do, we want to support your efforts. Playing sports is a great way to have fun, relieve stress, and improve or maintain your fitness. That’s why we want to do our part to help.
If you are wondering how a family dental office in North Richland Hills, TX can help you with sports, we understand. We don’t want you to suffer an injury, specifically a dental injury, which is why we make custom-fitted athletic mouthguards at our office.
You deserve to preserve your winning smile from game to game, season to season, and long after your playing days are over. If you aren’t wearing a mouthguard now, we want to give you some reasons to start doing so.
Call us today at 817-281-4801 if you have questions or to make an appointment at the office of R.R. Williams, DDS.
Save Your Smile
We don’t want to be misleading. Wearing a mouthguard won’t prevent you from having an accident during a sporting event. It also won’t stop every single possible dental injury. However, having a properly fitted mouthguard can greatly reduce the risk of such an injury or minimize the extent of an injury.
The American Dental Association has noted that athletes who wear mouthguards are 60 times less likely to suffer an oral injury than athletes who don’t wear them.
Yet, surveys show that a vast majority of youth sports participants do not wear them. Mouthguards may not be required for your sport of choice, but they are probably recommended by the ADA, the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry, and other dental organizations. To illustrate the value of mouthguards, consider football. Before mouthguards were required, 25 percent or more football injuries were dental injuries. Today less than 1 percent of football injuries are oral injuries.
Mouthguards are recommended for all high-impact sports. These are sports that involve one or more of the following:
- Jumping
- Changing speeds and/or directions
- Hitting or throwing things (e.g. balls, discs, pucks)
- Physical contact between athletes
In other words, even if you play a sport that does not involve touching another person (like tennis), a mouthguard is still recommended for your sport.
Better Fit Means Better Protection
Again, to be clear, any mouthguard is better than no mouthguard for most sports. But there are reasons the ADA and AAPD recommend custom-fitted mouthguards.
You can compare this to the kinds of protection you can find in motor vehicles. Taking the field without a mouthguard is like driving without a seat belt. Wearing a store-bought mouthguard is similar to wearing your seat belt and maybe having an airbag depending on the mouthguard.
But a custom mouthguard is more like the five-point harness that race drivers wear when they take the track. Custom mouthguards also are smaller, which make them more comfortable to wear. It’s also easier to speak, drink water, and breathe with a custom mouthguard than the bulky mouthguards you find in stores.
Get Equipped
Many sports have specific equipment you need in order to play. Make a custom-fitted athletic mouthguard part of your gear. Call R.R. Williams DDS in North Richland Hills, TX today at 817-281-4801 or fill out our online form to schedule an appointment.