{"id":2593,"date":"2017-06-27T16:40:21","date_gmt":"2017-06-27T20:40:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gwinnettsmiles.com\/?p=2593"},"modified":"2018-12-31T16:34:58","modified_gmt":"2018-12-31T16:34:58","slug":"tongue-says-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/2017\/06\/27\/tongue-says-health\/","title":{"rendered":"What Your Tongue Says About Your Health"},"content":{"rendered":"<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">At <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">my dental office in <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Lawrenceville<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, we spend a lot of time getting people to open up and say, \u201cAh!\u201d It\u2019s because your oral health can tell us a lot about what is going on in the rest of your body. Did you know that your tongue can also provide some pretty interesting clues about you too?<\/span>\n<!--more-->\n<h3>What Are You Looking At?<\/h3>\n<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Your tongue is really quite marvelous and it says a mouthful about oral and overall health. It consists of eight muscles and never ever gets tired. The tongue is constantly at work. At any given moment this super strong muscle could be doing one (or more) of the following with or without you even being aware of it:<\/span>\n<ul>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"color: #008000;\"><em><strong>Helping break down food<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/li>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"color: #008000;\"><em><strong>Helping you speak clearly<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/li>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"color: #008000;\"><em><strong>Filtering out bad germs<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/li>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"color: #008000;\"><em><strong>Pushing saliva down the throat (even during sleep)<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>What Are You Looking For?<\/h3>\n<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The next time you\u2019re in front of a mirror, go ahead and stick out your tongue. Take a long look and note what you\u2019re seeing. Are there red or white spots? Is it dark and almost hairy in appearance? Is there any redness? What you see could say a lot about what\u2019s going on inside your mouth and inside your whole body. It\u2019s important to keep a keen eye on anything that\u2019s abnormal or feels suspicious so you can let <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">your <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Lawrenceville<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> dentist <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">do a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/preventive-services.html\">thorough examination<\/a>. Here are some examples of what you might find and what it means:<\/span>\n<ul>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>White Patches <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8211; This could signify an overgrowth of candida (yeast) fungus. It\u2019s common in babies and young children and is easily treated with a prescription anti-fungal rinse or pill.<\/span><\/li>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>Black\/Hairy Appearance<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> &#8211; Diabetes, a yeast infection, poor <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/preventive-services.html\">oral hygiene<\/a>, or cancer therapies could be to blame. <\/span><\/li>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>White\/Red Spots <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8211; These obvious spots are actually quite common. They are usually the result of worn down taste buds.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>Redness <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8211; Illnesses like strep throat or deficiencies in B-12, folic acid, and iron can also cause this kind of irritation.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>Bumps<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> &#8211; Large bumps or sores on the tongue are often a sign of canker and cold sores.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n \t<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>Webbing or Stripes<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> &#8211; This can signal a chronic oral lichen planus which is a chronic condition that occurs when your immune system is attacking cells.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n&nbsp;\n\n<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Be on the lookout for anything suspicious or anything your tongue might be trying to tell you. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/\">Please call <\/a><\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">my <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Lawrenceville<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> dental office <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and let us take a look. Together we can get to the bottom of the problem and decide what treatment (if any) will get you and your tongue healthy again. <\/span>\n\n<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Welcoming <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/new-patient-info.html\">new patients<\/a> from <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Lawrenceville, Duluth, Suwanee and beyond.&nbsp;<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At my dental office in Lawrenceville, we spend a lot of time getting people to open up and say, \u201cAh!\u201d It\u2019s because your oral health can tell us a lot about what is going on in the rest of your body. Did you know that your tongue can also provide some pretty interesting clues about you too? <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/2017\/06\/27\/tongue-says-health\/\">(Read More)<\/a>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2594,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-oral-health","category-overall-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2593"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2593\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2860,"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2593\/revisions\/2860"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gwinnettsmiles.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}