Health Visitors Urge Parents To Avoid Long-term Bottle And Dummy Use To Prevent Dental Health Problems
Health visitors in Scunthorpe are urging parents to avoid giving their babies dummies and bottles on a long-term basis in a bid to reduce the number of children affected by dental problems.
A team of health visitors took time to talk to parents at Parkwood Children’s Centre recently with the aim of educating parents about the implications of long-term dummy and bottle use.
Community nursery nurse, Layla Barnes, said that many parents are unaware that sucking on a dummy or a bottle teat for a long period of time increases the risk of a child developing dental problems, as well as potential issues with their speech and orthodontic problems, such as protruding front teeth.
The team is hoping to help parents to wean children off dummies and encourage them to give children cups, rather than bottles, once they are old enough to hold and grip them properly.
Ideally, the health visitors are hoping to encourage parents to stop using dummies and bottles by the time their children reaches their first birthday.
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