Sports Drinks and Soda could be an acid bath for your teeth
Most people know that sugary substances can be bad for your teeth and can promote decay. What they probably don’t think about is how acidic foods and drink can also cause damage. Your teeth have a very hard outer shell (enamel) which holds up remarkably well to decades of use, but can be damaged by acidic substances in addition to tooth decay. Once you have eroded, decayed or worn through enamel, the inside of the tooth is not as hard and will be damaged at a faster rate.
Acidity is measured on a pH scale of zero to 14. A pH of 7 is “neutral” and anything under 7 is acidic. For example, milk is usually around 6.7 and water is about 7.3 (“pure” water is technically neutral = 7). Batery acid is near 1.0 and lemon juice is around 2.0 (very acidic). Base liquids like ammonia or lye are usually between 12-13 pH.
The pH scale is logarithmic. meaning that a pH of 4 is 10 times more acidic than a pH of 5 and 100 times more acidic than a pH of 6.
In the last couple of decades, soda and sports drinks (Gatorade, Powerade, etc) have become much more available and manufactured in containers that can be resealed, allowing for continued use for long periods of time. Athletes and people who work outdoors like to use sports drinks to replenish fluid and electrolytes. These drinks (and a number of others) can be damaging to your teeth if used over long periods of time.
According to some reports, sports drinks can range in the area of 2.3 – 4.4 pH and soda from approximately 2.7 – 4.0 pH. As you can imagine, even at the high end of that range, these types of drinks can be very acidic.
Although it probably isn’t realistic to think that our patients will never drink soda or sports drinks, it is important to know that the more exposure to acid (and sugar), the more you will damage your teeth. If you do drink these types of liquids, it is a good idea to limit the amount of time they are in your mouth. it takes only seconds for acid to soften your teeth and hours for saliva and fluoride to repair (remineralize) the enamel. Knowing that, it makes sense that sipping on drinks for a long period of time is much more damaging than drinking them in a short time.
Don’t give your teeth an acid bath all day long by sipping on acidic drinks like soda, sports drinks, iced tea (pH near 3.0) or citrus drinks like grapefruit or orange juice. You only get a limited amount of enamel on your teeth – treat it well and it can last a lifetime.