VOA慢速英语--新药物能帮助牙齿自我修复

I am going to take a chance and say that very few people enjoy going to the dentist, especially for a filling.

A dentist usually treat a cavity by removing the damaged part of the tooth. Then they fill the hole with porcelain 1 or a combination of silver and other metals.

Oftentimes fillings need replaced during the patient’s lifetime. But is filling the cavity with a foreign material really the best treatment? What if the tooth could repair itself with its own material – dentine?

That is what researchers at King's College London are studying. They have found a process that may replace the traditional method.

Researchers say they may be close to perfecting a method of helping 2 teeth to repair themselves. They say the treatment may make the filling of a cavity a thing of the past.

Paul Sharpe of King’s College says a new treatment for cavities is simpler. It uses a drug that causes the tooth to fill in the hole naturally with dentine.

"[It] involves putting a drug on a little sponge that goes inside the tooth, in the hole that the dentist made. It stimulates 4 this natural process, which is starting to occur anyway following the damage, but it over-activates the process so you actually get the big hole repaired and the repair is a production of the natural material, the dentine."

Usually a new drug requires repeated testing before it is approved for treatment. However, this drug that produces the regrowth in teeth has already been approved. It is a drug currently used to treat Alzheimer’s disease and other disorders 5 of the nervous system.

Sharpe explains that when using this already-approved drug to repair cavities, researchers use only a small amount and they use it locally. Usually that means the medicine is put directly on the affected 6 area. It does not travel through the patient’s blood.

"We are using much smaller doses and we're delivering them locally, just in a tooth.”

Nigel Carter heads Britain’s Oral Health Foundation. He describes the new treatment as an exciting possibility for dental care. He notes that re-growing a tooth would be a major development. But Carter also has a warning.

"Actually re-growing the tooth that's been lost with a cavity would be really a huge step forward. But, it's also important that we remember that we shouldn't be getting the cavity in the first place. We're talking about a totally preventable disease."

Although the new treatment uses a drug to cause the regrowth, it still requires the dentist to use a power drill.

So, if you don't want to go under the drill, the dentists advise us to keep cleaning those teeth.

I’m Anna Matteo.

Words in This Story

dentist – n. a person whose job is to care for people's teeth

dental – adj. of or relating to teeth or to the work dentists do

dentine – n. a calcareous material similar to but harder and denser 7 than bone that composes the principal mass of a tooth

cavity – n. an area of decay in a tooth

porcelain – n. a hard, white substance that is very delicate and that is made by baking clay

sponge – n. a piece of light natural or artificial material that becomes soft when it is wet, is able to take in and hold liquid, and is used for washing or cleaning

stimulate 3 – v. to make (something) more active

dose – n. the amount of a medicine, drug, or vitamin that is taken at one time