It is important to not only think about the amount of sugar you eat but the frequency and timing of it too. You should try to avoid sugary foods between meals, instead eating them as part of a main meal and ending with something savoury. A piece of cheese after any dessert is ideal to reduce any residual sugars and neutralise acids in the mouth. Avoid anything sugary before bed.

You naturally have less saliva in your mouth at night so it will take longer to balance things in the mouth out during the night, so after you have brushed your teeth before bed you shouldn’t have anything else to eat or drink other than water. Avoid sticky sweets. If you’re going to have a sweet treat,stick to something like chocolate which will melt and wash away quicker than toffees for example. Equally, other sticky sweets or hard sweets that you’d suck on keep sugars in your mouth, these are best avoided.

The same does go for fruit, although fruit is healthy it contains natural unprocessed sugars, these sugars can do as much damage as other forms of sugar if consumed too often. Dried fruit can linger in the mouth for longer and have a higher and have a higher concentration of sugar.