Children certainly love juice, and many parents allow their children to have juice whenever they want.
After all, it’s kind of like a fruit or vegetable… right?
Well, no.
Let’s pause for a quick chemistry lesson.
Sugar lowers the pH in your child’s mouth. The lower the pH of your child’s mouth, the more prone their teeth are to cavities.
It takes time for your mouth to raise its pH after eating – no matter what is being eaten. So the frequency that your child drinks something or snacks on something is just as important as what they snack on. In other words, if your child eats a cookie every two hours, that’s just as bad as if they were to eat candy all day.
In other words, you need to make sure that you space your child’s snacks out – and that includes juice!
Our answer to the question “is juice healthy?” is…
… a little juice goes a long way.
In fact, the American Association of Pediatrics recommends that your child should consume no more than four to six ounces of juice per day.
Why? Well, a recent study shows that juice has the highest sugar content in of all the foods that we give to our children.
So if you want to keep the cavities away, serve water instead of juice.
Still curious? Dr. Joye goes into detail about which snacks and beverages are actually healthy in the video below.
Dr. Joye does a Facebook Live twice a month at 5:30 pm. Follow us on Facebook to be notified when she goes live next!
You can find all of Dr. Joye’s video chats on our YouTube channel.
Have more questions about supporting your child’s dental health? Give us a call anytime at 336-887-9277 (WARR) to ask questions or to schedule an appointment. BONUS: we offer FREE first visits for children 2 and under! Call the above number for details.