Posted by This project depicts the importance of proper oral hygiene and how bacteria can eat through the mucosal connective tissue and make it into the blood stream to life-giving organs if the gingiva (gums) are not properly taken care of.
Connective Tissue and Oral Hygiene
Hi Rebecca! You did a really great job on your project, I like how you drew and labeled everything because outlining where and what everything is helped me to understand this concept so much better! I never knew that not taking care of your gums could cause the same bacteria infecting the gums to travel into your organs. That just proves how important it is to take care of your teeth and to practice the correct oral hygiene. I can see through your visual representation that you can decipher between which gums are infected and which gums are not infected. Those that are inflamed carry the bacteria in them and when the tissue pocket is formed the bacteria becomes trapped inside. Once this occurs the bacteria is then able to travel through the tissue and into the nerve and the bloodstream. It can then make its way towards our life-giving organs and can cause very serious issues. I always just assumed that when teeth become infected they would only infect the mouth, I never knew that the bacteria could actually travel. I have experienced cavities before and had to get them filled when I was a child, I have also had a tooth infection as a child and it was definitely very painful. My dentist wasn’t aware that I had an infection in my tooth so he just pulled it out without ever treating the infection. I can’t quite remember what happened after but I assume that he would have given me antibiotics to kill the infection. If my infection had never been treated, what you illustrate in your drawing might have happened to me. The bacteria could have traveled into my nerve and blood stream and they might have traveled into my life-giving organs, which would have been very dangerous! I definitely learned a lot through your project and you did a wonderful job!!