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World Smile Day: What It Is, Why It’s Important, and What You Can Do

September 17, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — kids-dentistry @ 3:13 pm
Woman smiling while volunteering in food pantry

The yellow smile icon has become such a prominent symbol in the age of text, email, and social media. In fact, it’s so commonplace that you probably haven’t stopped to wonder where it originated from. It was actually first created by an artist in Worcester! In 1999, October 4th was declared World Smile Day to help bring attention to its original meaning. To learn what it is, why it’s important, and how you can get involved, read on!

The Message Behind World Smile Day

Over the years, the yellow smile icon has been commercialized to the point where the original message has been lost. On October 4th, its original purpose is recognized: sharing a smile, joy, and kindness regardless of religion, ethnicity, politics, or any other differences. When it can feel like there is uncertainty, anxiety, and sadness everywhere you turn, this message is arguably more important than ever.

Maintaining a Healthy, Happy Smile

Naturally, you and your children may be hesitant to smile if you aren’t happy with how it looks. The first step in combatting that is implementing a solid oral hygiene regimen, which starts with brushing each morning and extends to flossing each evening. It’s also important to adopt other healthy habits, including wearing a mouthguard during sports, keeping added sugar to a minimum, and getting a dental checkup and teeth cleaning twice a year.

If your child is having trouble smiling confidently, chewing properly, or speaking clearly because their teeth are crowded together or spaced apart, then it’s important to schedule an orthodontic consultation! That way, their teeth are moved into proper alignment, benefiting everything from their confidence to their digestion in the process.

The Final Step: Get Involved

Sharing a smile can go a long way. If you want to get more involved in spreading joy, kindness, and compassion, then consider finding ways to get involved in your community! That could be everything from donating school supplies to giving money to a local charity. Ultimately, you want to find something that you and your family can do together to help instill the importance of giving back and doing what you can to make the world a better place.

About the Practice

For our New Britain pediatric dental team, it’s important that our passion for serving people extends beyond our office walls. Since we’re a part of the Simply Doing Good network, we’ve had the honor of coordinating classroom supply drives, supporting organizations like the Boys & Girls Club, and hosting our annual Toys for Tots charity drive. If you want to learn more about our efforts and how you can get involved, get in touch with us via our website or by phone at (860) 224-2419.

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