Health

Mouthguard information

Mouthguards can protect you from some serious sporting injuries, such as broken jaws, fractured, cracked or knocked-out teeth, cut lips and tongues.

You don’t just have to be playing obvious contact sports like rugby union, rugby league, AFL, hockey and boxing to sustain those kind of injuries. Even non-contact sports like cricket, basketball, netball, touch football, skateboarding and soccer, carry a real risk of accidental collision, and resulting dental trauma.

A custom-fitted mouthguard works by absorbing and spreading the impact of the damaging blow, and is fabricated based on an impression of your teeth and jaw taken by your dentist.

In contrast, over-the-counter mouthguards do not protect the teeth, are loosely fitted, 

impede breathing and speaking and can even wedge in the back of the throat at impact.

For more information visit: www.ada.org.au

Jenny Hill

College Nurse

Reference:  Australian Dental Association