Here’s the truth. For most people, cleaning your teeth REALLY WELL just ONCE a day is the best way to stay out of my chair. The trick is to do it REALLY WELL!
If your experience of learning how to clean your teeth was anything like mine, someone probably showed you how to do it at school when you were about six and then no one ever talked about it again. Like most things we learn to do when we are young, most of us by now have developed an ‘auto pilot’ mode. We’re not thinking too much about what we’re doing. We’re too busy thinking about the other bazillion things we have to get done during the day. Quite often we are missing the same spots over and over again and we’d never know. Well, that is until now.
How do you know whether you’re looking after your teeth well?
I was a bit of an oral health delinquent when I was younger. I brushed my teeth most days but probably skipped more than a few days. I was a complete sugar fiend growing up too. My favourite after school snack was a glucose powder sandwich – yep fresh white fake bread, butter and piles of glucose powder!!! This was only the tip of my sugar ice berg!
As a result I am now the owner of 8 molars complete with great big amalgam fillings. Yay! Not.
I am getting older, the fillings are getting older too. They are going to be in need of some major renovation soon. It would have been so much nicer to not have had them in the first place.
It was not until I became a dental assistant when I was 18, that I realised how easy it was to avoid dental problems just by cleaning my teeth better and by not feeding my ‘bugs’ so much sugar. Why hadn’t someone told me sooner??
All our patients at Your New Dentist know that we are passionate about helping you to save time and money in the dental chair. In the nicest possible way, we want not to see of you!
At Your New Dentist we use Plaque disclosing solution the enemy number one to the bacteria that cause dental decay and gum disease. Here’s what it looks like. It’s a triple coloured dye that sticks to bacteria. It’s very funky stuff.
The colours you see are the different bacteria. The pink colour is about 24 hours old. The dark blue is over 48 hours old. If we were to scrape the dark blue off, underneath it we would see a bright aqua blue. As far as cavities are concerned, the aqua blue ones are the really scary bugs. They produce the acid. Without the dye these teeth actually looked quite clean. It can sometimes come as a shock to see what spots you might be missing.
Whether we like it or not, the bacteria responsible for dental problems are hanging around all the time. Our mouths can never be 100% free of them, but we can stop them from attaching to our teeth and gums and sitting there for a prolonged period of time where they can host what we affectionately like to call ‘bug parties”. The more sugar you feed them the bigger and more out of control the bug party gets.
At Your New Dentist, we give away single coloured plaque disclosing tabs at every check-up, so you can see how well you are brushing at home.
Let’s shut down some bugs parties…Here’s how to use a plaque disclosing tablet.
1. Pop a plaque disclosing tablet in your mouth. Crush it up. Swish it around. Coat all your teeth. Spit out the remaining dye.
2. The dye will stick to the plaque, it will be heaviest in the problem areas of your mouth.
3. Brush and floss – pay particular attention to the problem areas.
4. Rinse. Bug party shut down.
5. Smile!
If your gums bleed persistently EVEN though you’re brushing and flossing really well, you might be due for a professional clean to remove TARTAR. That’s hard calcified plaque that just about everyone builds up over time. Brushing and flossing alone isn’t enough to shift it. Your New Dentist can remove it using an Ultrasonic cleaner.
Simply brushing and flossing your teeth REALLY well even just once a day will reduce your risk of cavities, or gum disease and could help you save thousands of dollars on your dental bills.