It’s easy to fall for trends with thousands of videos and comments promising quick application, affordable options, and lasting results. TikTok DIY hacks can help you discover easy tricks for fashion, cooking, and cleaning, but when it comes to your dental health, these trends can cause permanent damage to your gums and teeth. Though they may seem simple and look effective, most of these trends are too good to be true.
Here are five at-home dental TikTok trends to stay away from:
1. Teeth Filing
A recent popular dental trend on TikTok has been to take a nail file and file the ends of your teeth into a straight line, to shave them down for at-home veneers, or to create a tooth gap with a nail drill for aesthetic looks. Although a dental professional may help you shape your teeth by using tools for enameloplasty, filing your own teeth at home can lead to irreversible damage. Harmful risks of filing your own teeth include:
- Enamel Damage: When using nail files to shape your own teeth, you can remove an excessive amount of enamel, or even accidentally chip and crack your teeth. Once broken or detached, enamel cannot grow back. Filing the enamel away removes the protective barrier forever.
- Structural Impairment: With improper tooth filing, you risk uneven teeth, leading to bite misalignment and jaw pain.
- Sensitive Teeth: Because the tooth’s enamel can be stripped away, the inner layer of the tooth is exposed, leaving sensitive nerves open and leading to intense pain when eating or drinking.
- Tooth Decay: Another side effect of roughly filed teeth is the bacteria and plaque that collect in uneven edges that can cause tooth decay and infection.
2. DIY Orthodontics
Another TikTok trend that can be extremely harmful is trying to close gaps between teeth by using small rubber bands. Even though some influencers on TikTok may claim that they avoided getting braces with this method, DIY bands can harm your jaw’s structure and gumline:
- Ruined Roots: With uncertain pressure from rubber bands, the tooth’s roots can shift too much and become weak, leading to instability or even tooth loss.
- Gum Damage: Because teeth become narrow at the top, rubber bands can slip up below the gum line, causing infection and inflamation ot the gums.
3. Mewing
Mewing, a technique where you press your tongue up against the roof of your mouth to make your jaw line appear sharper, has gone viral as a trend for the instant change it makes to your face and the claim that it changes your jaw shape over time. When done excessively, this practice can lead to unnecessary complications:
- Shifting Teeth: Upper teeth can become loose or space apart with constant pressure from the tongue pushing behind them.
- Jaw Pain: Overuse of the jaw from consistently pressing it forward with the tongue can lead to joint pain, headaches, and clicking.
4. Tooth Gems
A fun fashion trend that has been taken on by pop stars, teenagers, and many online influencers is the tooth gem. These gems are tiny, decorative beads that are glued to the front of a tooth. Some wear just one gem, and others will wear a cluster of them to create unique and personal designs. These gems can be stylish, but can ultimately cause potential problems for your dental health:
- Plaque Buildup: Bacteria and plaque get trapped around and inside the tooth gems, in hard to reach spaces, leading to cavities, bad breath, and gum disease.
- Enamel Damage: DIY adhesives for the tooth gem, like nail glue, super glue, or other chemicals, can eat away at your tooth’s enamel. This can lead to tooth decay, cavities, and tooth sensitivity.
5. Household Chemical Teeth Whitening
There are always new rising trends for homemade whitening solutions, some safer than others. From lemon juice to baking soda and hydrogen peroxide, you must take precautions when using household chemicals to alter the color of your teeth. Hydrogen peroxide can seem like a helpful option, but it can cause bigger problems for your teeth:
- Gum Pain: High doses of hydrogen peroxide can burn your gums, cause irritation over time, and kill the soft tissues of your gumline.
- Strips Down Enamel: Like other trends, hydrogen peroxide whitening can destroy your enamel. Inflaming the nerve vessels in your teeth and eating away at the enamel, this can lead to tooth sensitivity and root decay.
- Uneven Shades: DIY teeth whitening can cause splotchy whitening, with uneven shades of teeth, making them look dirty.
Trust The Professionals at Avenues Family Dentistry
When unsure how to best care for your dental health, make sure to reach out to a licensed dentist. Whether you’ve accidentally chipped your tooth by trying to file it with a nail drill and need emergency care, or you are looking for professional solutions for whitening your teeth, the experts at Avenues Dentistry are here to help. Call now to learn more or set up an appointment today!
