Chewing Gum - Is it Bad Or Good For Your Dental Health?

By Susan Braden
Published Aug 12 2010

Will smacking on a piece improve or maintain your overall oral health? Or will you need to take out a dental insurance plan in order to fix the damage caused by your habit?

There are two types of gum: sugary and sugar free. Read on for the scoop on how each affects your teeth.

Sugary

As you can imagine, gum that contains a lot of sugar negatively affects your smile. Sugar is a major element of plaque, which is a build-up on the surface of your pearly whites that can cause gum disease and create cavities. By choosing a stick made with sugar, you’re simply worsening any oral problems that you may already have. Also, because the sugary kind is so sticky, it allows the sugars to actually stick to your teeth, thus attracting more plaque. Brush your teeth immediately after chewing this kind.

Sugar-Free

Conversely, gum that is made without any sugar is actually very helpful in maintaining your oral health. There are three ways in which the sugar-free kind is useful:

1. Removing food particles. Because of the sticky surface, sugar-free varieties can actually help to eliminate any captive food particles from between the teeth and help remove sugar that has built on the surface of the teeth.
2. Preventing the build up of plaque. Though the sugary kind is also sticky, it adds to the build up of sugar rather than removing it. Because the sugarless kind assists in the removal of sugars and food particles from the surface of the teeth, it therefore helps prevent the formation of plaque, which is a great benefit to general health. 
3. Freshening breath. Finally, sugar-free gums come in a variety of different flavors. A mint-flavor, such as spearmint or peppermint, can help to freshen your breath. Hard mints also freshen breath, but they are not as beneficial to overall general oral health as they do not remove food particles from your teeth.

Smacking your gum alone may not require you to purchase a dental insurance plan. Chewing it, as long as it contains no sugar, is actually beneficial to your oral health! Not only is it fun to chew and a great breath-freshener, it also assists in the removal of food particles and the prevention of plaque.

So the next time you crave something to much on, grab sugar-free piece and chew away cavity-causing particles and plaque. Your mouth and your dentist may thank you.

A dental insurance plan, however, may be a help to you if your teeth are damaged for other reasons.