Now that the FIFA Women’s World cup is in full swing and the talented ladies representing the U.S. continuing to climb the ranks in the competition, people across the country are going to be feeling the urge to get outside and kick the ball around in the spirit of the WWC. This has gotten dental implants Cherry Hill, NJ dentist Dr. Donn wondering if this fresh outbreak of soccer fever is going to mean more people in dental offices needing dental implants or emergency dental care.
Now, you might be wondering why we are even making a connection between the 2015 FIFA WWC and dental implants. You might also be thinking that assuming people are going to be needing emergency dental care because of a fresh outbreak of dental fever may be a bit of a stretch.
Well… you’re wrong. Please, let us elaborate. And by elaborate we mean take a look at these statistics.
Nearly 5 million teeth are avulsed (a fancy word for knocked out) each year. Many of these teeth are lost during sporting activities. These facts have resulted in an annual $500 million dollars spent each year replacing missing teeth.
But wait, there’s more.
According to an issue of the Journal of the American Dental Association, a staggering 13-39% of all dental injuries, annually, are sports related in nature. The information that gave the results for this study was gathered from reviewing reported dental injuries from all over the world in the last thirty years.
And don’t go just yet… this isn’t even the most concerning part.
Let’s take a looks at American football for a second. American football is a sport in which the wearing of protective gear is mandatory. Statistics show that about 75% of players choose to wear mouth guards despite the fact that their helmets have protective face masks. Now, that’s not so bad. 75% is pretty decent. It’s not great, but it’s not terrible either. We’ll take what we can get.
Then we have soccer. Beautiful European football. The original football.
Soccer is a high contact sport which really has no uniform requirements for the use of protective gear. Only a staggering 7% of players choose to wear a mouthguard. There are no helmets or protective face masks in soccer either. Still, the vast majority of players do not even think about the safety of their teeth when they step onto the field.
In addition to the fact that most soccer players choose not to wear mouthguards, also consider that they often receive elbows to the mouth or have another player’s head accidentally smash into their mouth, and of course there’s slide tackling. All of these things can result in teeth being knocked out. Of course this is all in good sport and in the spirit of the game, however, this doesn’t make the threat to soccer player’s teeth any less grievous.
So…How does this make any sense? Oh, that’s right. It doesn’t.
It’s nonsense.
With that being said, you now have the reason we connect soccer with dental implants and emergency dental care.
So what does Dr. Donn suggest to all of his soccer hungry fans anxious to get out there and kick the ball around? It’s simple really.
Wear a mouthguard for teeth’s sake! Sheesh! These are your teeth we’re talking about here!
other than that, then by all means go run, jump, play and laugh. Just be prepared for a few skinned knees and elbows. But really what’s soccer without scrapes? Just no broken teeth, please.
Until next time readers, keep rooting for team USA and keep smiling.