More About Dental Sealants

Sealants can help preserve a child’s smile for a lifetime.  Though dental sealants are not a cure-all in preventing tooth decay, they are cost-effective and helpful to patients – particularly children – in controlling decay in the back teeth with grooves.

Sealants are valuable in preventing decay because they seal the tooth grooves which are virtually impossible to clean effectively.  Even a single toothbrush bristle cannot reach all the way into the depressions and grooves to extract food particles, bacteria and plaque. 

In this painless procedure, a solution is applied to the chewing surface of the tooth to condition the enamel and help it bond more effectively to the sealant material.  The tooth is thoroughly washed and dried.  Then the sealant material is applied and allowed to harden, sometimes using ultraviolet light.  The procedure takes only a few minutes.

Depending on your chewing pattern, the sealant effect can last many years.  Even though sealant material is durable, at subsequent dental appointments we make sure the sealant material is intact.  Occasionally, we might need to replace or add a new layer of sealant material to keep the protective barrier strong and effective.

For more information about sealants and other dental topics visit DrTav.com

Why Are Regular Dental Checkups Important?

In most cases when there is a problem with our health we feel a symptom in our body. When we get a symptom, such as pain for example, it’s a signal for us to do something about it. Most of us go to the physician to find out what’s going on.  We want to find out what’s causing the pain/problem.

I don’t know why it is this way, but we have seen advanced dental disease in people who never had pain. There were signs and symptoms, but no pain in many instances. This isn’t unusual with dental disease. The signs were bleeding gums, loose teeth, gaps forming between teeth, bad taste or odor in the mouth, discoloration of teeth.  However, without any pain, it is often easy for some people to ignore or be unaware of the signs before it’s too late.

We have seen people with teeth so loose, the teeth come out by themselves – but the person didn’t have pain during the entire time the dental bone holding their teeth in their mouth was being destroyed by infectious bacteria.  We have also seen people with the entire crown of the tooth destroyed by decay, and there never was any pain.

Regular dental checkups are important so that we have an opportunity as dental professionals to find any problems that may be present at the earliest time during the disease process. We want to diagnose gum disease early, before there is any bone loss around the teeth and subsequent tooth loss. We want to discover any decay that might be present before it goes deeper into the tooth, destroys more tooth structure, and continues to enter the nerve of the tooth causing the need for root canal therapy in order to save the tooth. Finding any dental disease early takes less time and money and helps people to maintain their teeth for a lifetime. Dentures are not an inevitable result of aging. They can totally be avoided with regular dental checkups and necessary care when problems are minor.

For information about other dental topics visit www.TavorminaDentistry.com

Proper Flossing

Flossing daily removes plaque and food particles from between the teeth and below the gumline. A toothbrush only cleans approximately 20% of the tooth and gum surfaces. The remaining 80% of tooth and gum surfaces is between the teeth. That’s why flossing daily is so important to protect you from tooth decay and gum disease. Once a day flossing at night before you go to sleep is the best time to floss.

It’s best to use unwaxed dental floss so that when the floss is pressed against the tooth surface the fibers of the floss spread out. This fanning out of the floss produces a greater surface area of floss to do the job of removing the plaque. Sometimes when people have teeth that are very close to each other, it is difficult to get the floss between the teeth. If this sounds like you, you will need to use waxed dental floss. The wax helps the floss slide between the teeth.

Wrap an 18-inch strand of floss around your middle fingers and hold a one-inch section tightly. After you wrap the floss around your middle fingers, take your thumb and pointer finger and hold them as if you were pointing two guns away from you. Then take the fingers that are pretending to be the guns and put them down on the floss so that one inch is between your thumbs and pointer fingers. Holding the floss this way lets you be able to control the floss and be able to reach all the way to floss your back teeth.

Ease the floss between two teeth. Clean up and down several times while curving the floss around the teeth and going under the gumline. Don’t scrub. Just wrap the floss around the tooth and go up and down. Unwind the floss to put clean floss between your fingers that are holding the floss. A special tool called a floss threader is needed to floss between the teeth of a fixed bridge and under the fake teeth.

You may experience sore or bleeding gums for the first several days you floss, but the bleeding will stop because you are flossing. Remember that healthy gums don’t bleed.

For information about other dental topics visit DrTav.com

Correct Your Brushing Technique

Brushing your teeth at least twice daily helps prevent tooth decay and gum disease, the major causes of tooth loss. If you only brush your teeth once a day, then the best time to do so is at night, ideally before you go to sleep. When you are sleeping there is less movement of saliva and less clearance than when you are awake and swallowing more often.

Use a soft-bristle tooth brush. It is the kindest to your teeth and surrounding gum tissue. It is common to hear the recommendation of using an ADA-accepted fluoride toothpaste, and these toothpastes can be helpful in preventing decay, however, toothpaste is best used after you have removed plaque and food particles. Think about it, toothpaste is abrasive. The abrasive quality of toothpaste is somewhat helpful with keeping stain on the teeth under control, but abrasives can also wear away tooth structure and contribute to the possibility of gum recession.

Therefore, it is best to use a toothbrush without toothpaste. This way the bristles are in direct contact with the tooth and gum without the interface of abrasive toothpaste. The proper movement of the soft toothbrush bristles removes the plaque from under the gums. After plaque and food particles have been removed, the teeth are ready for a fluoride toothpaste.

On the outer and inner surfaces of the teeth brush at a 45-degree angle in a short jiggling motion to remove the plaque from beneath the gumline. Keep moving the toothbrush to the next group of teeth until all of the gumline has been cleaned of plaque. After this work at the gums, the cheek and tongue sides of the teeth can be brushed in an up and down motion. On the chewing surfaces hold the brush flat and brush back and forth. The tongue side of front teeth can also be brushed by holding the brush vertically and using a gentle up and down stroke with the toe of the brush.

Remember to brush your tongue in a back-to-front sweeping motion to remove plaque and freshen your breath.

For information about other dental topics visit DrTav.com

Keeping Your Baby's Teeth Healthy

baby teeth

Brushing is the most important thing for your baby's dental care, but those precious teeth need more than just regular cleanings to stay healthy. Below are a number of ways to keep your child's teeth in top shape for life.

Minerals and vitamins: Your baby needs the right building blocks to construct her pearly whites, and that means an adequate intake of calcium, phosphorus, fluoride, and other minerals and vitamins (particularly Vitamin C, which is a great to keep gums healthy).

Give cheese: Can't brush baby's teeth after she's had a high-carb or sugary snack? Slip her a slice of cheese. In addition to their high calcium content, cheeses, like Swiss and cheddar, encourage saliva production, which helps clear cavity-causing acids and sugars from the mouth.

Sugar: It may seem impossible to completely avoid sugars in your baby's diet, but you'll want to limit them as much as possible — particularly refined sugars (which are found in, of all things, commercial teething biscuits) and sticky natural sugars (such as those in dried fruits). Keep sweets to an asbolute minimum — no more than once or twice a day — and serve only with meals.

Use cups: Your baby may still love her bottle, but you'll want to get her used to drinking from a cup. Bottles and sippy cups containing milk or juice have been associated with tooth decay because they allow the liquid to pool in baby's mouth and on the teeth. If you’re afraid your baby will make too much of a mess drinking from a cup, use a sippy with a straw or just put water or very diluted juice in the sippy.

Reduce the juice: To cut back on sugar, only offer juice in a watered-down form and only with snacks and meals, not as an all-purpose tummy filler.

No nighttime bottles: Although your baby may love the comfort her bottle provides, don't let her go to sleep with one. She may (and probably will) leave the nipple in her mouth, and the drips and drops of fluid that dribble out can be broken down into acid, which erode those newly erupted teeth. Even if your child is still without any baby teeth, ban the bottle for sleeping, because it will only be that much harder to take away later.

For information about other dental topics visit DrTav.com

About Dental Implants

The facts about dental implants are helpful when considering replacing your missing teeth. Dental implants are the permanent way to replace missing teeth, with a look and feel that’s as close to your natural teeth that exists today.

Dental implants are metal posts or frames surgically placed into or onto the bone beneath the gums. The implants fuse with the jawbone providing a stable support to artificial teeth, preventing individual teeth, bridges or dentures from shifting in your mouth. They are a high-tech way to replace missing teeth, and offer more stability than traditional bridgework since they do not rely on neighboring teeth for support.

Implant supported teeth allow you to speak, smile, and eat with confidence. Knowing about dental implants and the comfort they provide is an amazing discovery. Teeth supported by dental implants stay in place so you experience comfort and confidence and the freedom to enjoy foods you haven’t eaten for years.

Once you’ve had implant treatment, you need to treat your new smile like you would your own teeth and be vigilant about your oral health. You want to protect your dental implants because they are your new tooth roots, and they may not be subject to decay like your natural teeth, but they are subject to gum disease. We recommend that our patients who have had dental implants visit us every 3 months for check-ups and professional cleanings. We also find that one of the best tools for protecting your dental implants and oral health at home is the Hydrofloss. It is an irrigator that changes the polarity of the water it uses and keeps dental plaque from accumulating under the gums. More about the Hydrofloss and dental hygiene for dental implants in future posts.

For information about other dental topics please visit DrTav.com