Think Before Your Sports Drink

by Kiki Bochi

More likely than not, your child regularly begs for sports or energy drinks, especially as summer temperatures rise. Besides the sugar, calories and caffeine, you now have another reason to say no. The Academy of General Dentistry recently reported that especially among adolescents, the consumption of sports and energy drinks is causing irreversible damage to teeth.

Apparently, the popular drinks have high levels of acidity, which erodes tooth enamel. Youths “consume these drinks assuming that they will improve their sports performance and energy levels and that they are ‘better’ for them than soda,” says Poonam Jain, lead author of the study reported in the journal, General Dentistry. “Most of these patients are shocked to learn that these drinks are essentially bathing their teeth with acid.”

While acidity levels can vary between brands and flavors, the researchers found that damage to enamel can occur after only five days of exposure to sports or energy drinks.

With a reported 30 to 50 percent of U.S. teens consuming energy drinks, and as many as 62 percent consuming at least one sports drink per day, parents should be aware of the downside of these drinks. Damage caused to tooth enamel is irreversible, and without the enamel’s protection, teeth become overly sensitive, prone to cavities, and more likely to decay.

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“Teens regularly come into my office with these types of symptoms, but they don’t know why,” says dentist Jennifer Bone, a spokesperson for the Academy of General Dentistry. “They don’t realize that something as seemingly harmless as a sports or energy drink can do a lot of damage to their teeth.”