Role of Streptococcus mutans

requent and prolonged consumption of carbohy drate-rich substrates from a nursing bottle may cause a type of rampant carios in infants that is referred to as Nursing Bottle Claries (NBC]) or Baby Bottle Tooth De-eay n i l ? iccs su rmcesi mat arej canes process; usually at low risk. The last few years more attention has been paid to oli M l V f with a decline of the caries prevalence, it became ap parent that a small percentage of children is still highly affected by caries.1 Different criteria regarding diagnosis of the disease biases the outcomes of prevalence stud-ies.:U Examples of criteria are: decay of the labial or lingual surfaces of at least two maxillary incisors without further restrictions to the location of other carious le sions or age of the patient; decay of at least * three of the maxillary incisors; or maxillary incisors a (Tec ted and fur ther decay in the order of eruption..'1"*5 It is important to classify Nursing Bottle Caries in accordance with the lat ter * combining appearance in the eruption sequence, during which caries attacks, and the type of tooth af fected/5 O f liie four etiologie (actors in the caries process, diet and lime have been addressed in detail This regards the sweetened liquids in the nursing bottle, the frequency vriV » ’ » Ì