Thank goodness for the affordable dental plans that everyday folks are able to find. In olden times, losing most of your natural teeth by the time you reached middle age would not have been something surprising. Of course, there was that period of world history where members of the taxonomic group Homo sapiens had a life expectancy that was incredibly shorter than the one we’ve come to sort of take for granted today. Has modern medicine progressed enormously since the moment when the storied Eve left her seven-and-a-half-size footprint near a South African lagoon (nearly 117,000 years ago)? Certainly, and a dental health insurance plan was not likely to even make frequent appearances in the dreams of those long-ago foreparents.

That in 2012 it is possible to keep your natural permanent teeth well into your tenth decade merits more than a generous round of applause. Needless to say, doing that well for yourself requires some forethought on the part of your parents, yourself, throughout the years, and on the ways in which society is organized so that you can access dental services you can afford and take advantage of. If you can, get low cost dental insurance to protect the longevity of your teeth and smile.

Today, people know that it’s smart to make regular visits to a dentist who can give a general diagnosis on the health of the many tissues found within the mouth. They’re the ones responsible for thinking up plans for care when abnormalities appear. Knowing from the start the best ways to take nutrients so that they do not cause damage to teeth and mouth structures is something that can elevate your rate of success in terms of the soundness of teeth in old age. Whether you have dental insurance or not, limiting your snacking time to designated time frames instead of eating small amounts of snacks continuously throughout the day reigns in the damage that acids cause to your teeth. Visiting a dentist regularly is a way of making sure that this type of information, or reminders, are circulating within your home life, whether as an individual or as a family.

Sam Walters is a writer living in Los Angeles. Her writing appears in print and online.