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Dr. Katie Jones from Southeast Family Dental talks about alternatives to high-sugar drinks, what you need to look for on the label and how you can still get your caffeine fix without all the sugar.

https://youtu.be/XLg2Eg1owl4 

Hi, this is Dr. Jones from Southeast Family Dental and I’m gonna talk to you a little bit today about an alternative for soft drinks.

We’re always telling our patients to cut back on soft drinks, Coke, Mountain Dew, because of the sugar content. The sugar in and most soft drinks can wreak havoc on your teeth and so, we always get the question of well, what what can I drink? And, sparkling water is a great alternative to soft drinks. You still get the carbonation and kind of the fizz without all the sugar.

Dr. Geiger and I pretty much have some sort of sparkling water on our desks every day, and for most of them, the ingredients are carbonated water and natural flavoring.

• Non-caffeinated sparkling water

My favorite, my go-to is Spindrift. I love it and again the ingredients are carbonated water and raspberry puree and lime juice. So, Dr. Geiger, on the other hand, loves LaCroix, and these are her go-to again for – to get that kind of soda feel without all of the sugar.

There’s tons of options like this. The most important thing that I say to remember is to check the ingredients for the sugar content. I was at the store and went to buy a new flavor, a new brand, and I got home and looked at it and it had about 30 grams of sugar in it for one can. So, which is pretty much – which is the same thing as a soda.

So, if you’re looking for an alternative to soft drinks, I highly recommend sparkling waters – flavored and – but make sure to check the ingredients and make sure that there isn’t some sugar hiding in there.

• Sugar-free energy drinks

And the last thing I wanted to talk about is an alternative for energy drinks, because that is one of the other big things we hear from our patients, as you know part of their diet that is causing them to develop cavities. And so, there is typically a lot of sugar in energy drinks. And so, one of – a really good alternative is called Hiball, and it is – the ingredients are basically water and caffeine with some flavoring. So, it is a really really good alternative to some of those energy drinks as well as a Zevia sweetened energy drink. That as well is just again natural flavoring water and caffeine.

So, if you need that pick-me-up but all of the cream and sugar in your coffee is wreaking havoc or those energy drinks are wreaking havoc in your mouth, those are a couple ideas there that you can switch to and hopefully your dentist will be happy because you’ll be having less cavities.

So again, this is Dr. Jones from Southeast Family Dental and we can make you smile.