Keeping your milk teeth could save your life, confirm Spanish dentists
Wednesday, April 3, 2019 @ 12:19 AM
SPANISH dentists have confirmed that keeping hold of your milk teeth after they fall out could indeed save your life later on.
Dr Óscar Castro Reino, chairman of the General Council of Dentists in Spain, responded to a study recently published in the USA: “It has been shown that the cavity in your first teeth contain blood vessels, nerves and also stem cells which could be used to regenerate damaged tissue.”
These stem cells are preserved in the teeth via the umbilical cord, and can be used in regenerative therapy for diabetes, cancer and heart attacks.
And they are well-conserved because they have not been exposed to the same environmental damage as adult teeth, given that they fall out at between the ages of five and eight.
Dr Castro says keeping them – rather than letting the tooth fairy have them – is ‘an investment in your future’.
‘Tooth banks’ are already operating worldwide, especially in the USA, run by companies who keep milk teeth preserved until they are needed.
They need to be kept in optimum conditions – ideally frozen, in the same way as a woman’s eggs or a man’s sperm are frozen so they can have children later in life.
Read more at thinkSPAIN.com