A medical expert, Prof. Ademola Olaitan, on Wednesday advised Nigerians to visit the dental clinic once every six months to prevent oral afflicting diseases.
Olaitan gave the advice in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on the side line of the 64th Inaugural Lecture of the Lagos State University (LASU), Ojo.
The lecture was titled : The Pearly Gateway and Supports: Confrontation of Intruders to Sustain Beauty and to Maintain Functions.
The Professor of Oral Maxillofacial Surgery at LASU College of Medicine said that a visit to the dental clinic could save a life-long embarrassment of disfigurement.
According to him, oral and maxillofacial surgery specialty employs surgical manoeuvres and procedures in the treatment of diseases of the skull, face and the mouth.
It specializes in treating many diseases, injuries and defects in the head, neck, face, jaws and the hard and soft tissues of the region.
Olaitan, who was also President, National Postgraduate Medical College of Nigeria, said that a timely visit to the dental clinic would also prevent functional disability as well as emotional and psychological instability.
He listed the different diseases pattern afflicting oral and maxillofacial region, also known as the pearly gateway and support, to include oral cancer, cysts and tumours of the jaws and face.
Others, he said, are invective lesions, injuries and assault, keloids of the face and cleft palate, among others.
Earlier in his inaugural lecture, Olaitan warned that the mouth or the pearly gateway region should be handled with care because it was delicately fabricated and precisely positioned in the body.
He said “the face is the most exposed, adored, adorned, ‘panel beaten’, painted part of the body and beauty; good look and attractiveness resides and are appreciated in the region.
“It is appropriately positioned and has supports from several tissues and structures of the face.
“These are bones and jaws, the joints that facilitate movement of the jaws, muscles employed in biting and chewing, muscles of facial expressions, blood and lymphatic supplies to the face.
“Others are connective tissues and the skin that covers all these structures,” he said.
The medical expert explained that the pearly gateway supports are saddled with the responsibilities of co-ordinated fluent speeches, smiling, frowning, crying and other emotional expressions.
“Other functions are chewing, swallowing and harmony of the face. In certain situations when breathing becomes difficult or belaboured, the pearly gateway and supports are recruited for assistance,” he said.
According to him, intruders to the pearly gateway and support causes untoward experience such as displeasure, discomforts, psychological and emotional embarrassment, deformity and grotesque disfigurement of the face.
He named some of the facial and oral aggressors and intruders as facial keloid scars, human bites, idiopathic cervical abscess in children, ameloblastoma and cleft palate.
For proper cure and prevention of the diseases, Olaitan urged the Federal Government to improve health insurance and make sure healthcare was all inclusive.
This, he said, would enable some sufferers of such diseases who could not afford the treatment or surgery to be treated.