Your Jacksonville dentist Dr. Tiffany Shields is monitoring efforts to fund research into the effects of e-cigarettes and dental health. Dental researchers want to know the oral effects of the increasingly popular battery-powered devices that deliver cigarettes electronically and in an array of flavors, vapors, and venues ranging from convenience store to “vape shop” and including the Internet. The issue, however, is that the dental impact of such cigarettes is unknown.

As public health officials cast regulatory eyes on the relatively new and expanding e-cigarette market, an “evolving frontier” as the World Health Organization describes it, there’s little research available on the health risks to users and non-users and almost nothing on the oral effects of the contents and emissions of these nicotine delivery systems.

Electronic cigarettes are battery-powered devices with a metal heating element inside that vaporizes a solution containing a mixture of chemicals, including nicotine, natural flavors and other additives. As research into the impact of e-cigarettes on dental health unfolds, we’ll be sure to share information with our patients at Smiles by Shields.