Providing parents follow a few simple rules, it’s been said that they need not worry too much about their children eating sweets given out as ‘treats’ during Halloween. That’s according to Dr. John Moore who is based in San Antonio, Texas.

He suggests the following tips could prevent what he described as a mouth of horrors, while still letting children enjoy themselves at the festival.

1. Sit down with your child prior to going out trick or treating. Dr. Moore suggests having a chat to decide how the family should divide up the sweets.
2. Once the sweets have been brought home, screen them. Get rid of anything that might look more harmful or less tooth-friendly.
3. Don’t let children binge on their goodies. Set down ground rules as to how much they can eat over a period of time.
4. Sweets which are sticky are more likely to get stuck between teeth and under braces. As far as possible this type should be removed, leaving less ‘sticky’ products.
5. It is better to suck hard boiled type sweets rather than crunch. While sucking does expose the teeth to prolonged sugar exposure, crunching on the other hand can damage teeth and fillings.
6. The safest sweets to eat are soft products including chocolate, M&Ms and peanut type sweets. Luckily, this type of product tends to be the first to be consumed by children.
7. Set an example to your children. Don’t eat the loot that you are denying your children.
8. Add sugar free sweets to your children’s goodie bag to replace what you have removed.
9. After eating the sweets, give your child a sugar free gum to chew. This helps the production of saliva which in turn helps destroy bacteria, the reason for the build of plaque, tooth decay and gum disease.

10.   Encourage your son or daughter to floss after eating their sweets.