Losing a baby tooth is something of a rite of passage. It’s a sign of a new stage; a sign your child is growing up. And if you’re like a lot of families, it also means the Tooth Fairy may have left a little cash under your child’s pillow in the morning.
But what do you do with those teeth after you swap them out for a few bucks? Some parents like to keep them as sentimental keepsakes, others simply toss them.
Does it really matter?
Doctors say yes, as keeping a shed baby baby tooth matters quite a bit.
Baby Teeth Rich in Stem Cells
A study in 2003 showed that baby teeth are a rich source of stem cells, which are like protocells that can be grown into multiple kinds of cells if needed.
That means that if later in life, if their baby teeth were preserved quickly after falling out, when child needs replacement tissue for whatever reason, the stem cells from their baby teeth can be used to grow the needed tissue.
Potentially, the practice of storing baby teeth could save lives and treat a variety of ailments.
Properly Storing Baby Teeth
Unfortunately, simply keeping your child’s baby teeth in a box isn’t going preserve the tooth properly.
Instead, parents can use services like Store-A-Tooth to properly store their children’s teeth.
To use the Store-A-Tooth service, you will need to coordinate with our office before you child’s teeth come out. Our staff with work with the Store-A-Tooth staff to safely ship your child’s teeth, where the stem cells are extracted from the teeth and placed in a liquid nitrogen cryopreservation vault, where they will remain intact and usable for years.
If later in life, the child needs their stem cells, the samples are taken out of storage and shipped to their doctor.
Worth the Investment
Store-A-Tooth is a bit of an investment, but it’s worth the cost to know that your child’s stem cells will always be on hand in the case of a medical emergency.
Getting a dollar for a baby tooth is pretty cool, but getting the chance to grow heart cells from an old tooth? Now that’s even better.