Teeth in babies and toddlers are as important as adult teeth and are just as susceptible to decay. Tooth decay in infants & toddlers is commonly referred to as Baby Bottle Tooth Decay or Early Childhood Caries.
The key significance after using a bottle to feed your child is that you must stop its use after 12 months of age, especially if taking the bottle to bed. There may be risk of tooth decay, ear infections and low iron in your child if it is not stopped.
· At 6 months introduce a ‘Sippy cup’, interesting ways to make the first move using this is by placing ice inside and allowing your child to play with the cup and use it as a ‘shaker’
· Let them drink from the training cup when they want to.
· At 12 months completely swap the bottle with the training cup
· Swapping the bottle at night may be the most difficult – letting your child go to sleep with a bottle may still be suitable, switch the milk to water at night time, be aware that allowing your child to sleep with any form of liquid at night may cause your child to wake often either due to a wet nappy or that they have run-out of water.
· Sometimes the only option to remove the bottle is for it to be ‘collected’ by a fun character such as the ‘tooth fairy/ bottle fairy’, ‘Santa Claus’, ‘batman’ or any creature that the child prefers.
By 12 months of age, most babies have the coordination and hand skills needed to hold a cup and drink from it, if you are breastfeeding you can continue feeding your baby breast milk, but you may want to do so by offering it in a cup. Positive encouragement and praise for your child may be a vital element in this transition, in turn preventing decay and health issues in the future.
