Hi, this is Dr. Abalos from Sunbrite Dental, today I am just going to go over some of the common questions that I get regarding dental hygiene. Very good.
What is proper dental hygiene?
Proper dental hygiene includes some key components: one, brush twice a day; floss at least once a day so that we can get the stuff that we missed while brushing in between teeth. We love the Waterpik, but a lot of my patients say they love the little toothpick with the floss threader thing, and that's better than nothing, so I will take that. But I do prefer the Waterpik. And then the one key component that a lot of people miss out on is actually regular visits to the dentist. I usually find it's because we are not people's favorite place to go, but the key component that is missing in keeping away dental problems is those regular visits so that we can continue to help you prevent dental problems. But if we weren't able to help you prevent dental problems, then the next key part of it is to catch things early before they get really bad and lead to pain and heavy costs to fix dental problems.
What can happen if I don't practice good dental hygiene?
A lot of really bad things, and what's sad is a lot of the bad things that happen, like teeth rotting, teeth staining, teeth hurting, gums bleeding, 95% of the problems that patients do end up experiencing can all be prevented with just basic proper dental hygiene. And again, those are brushing your teeth at least twice a day, flossing once a day, and the key component is regular visits to the dentist.
What are the main duties of a dental hygienist?
Here at Sunbrite Dental, we hire dental hygienists to help us keep our patients healthy once we've fixed their dental problems. I tell them, "Yay, you've graduated to the healthy side," where you just see the dental hygienist for your regular hygiene visits. Then you'll see the doctor, such as myself or the other ones that work here at Sunbrite Dental, for just a routine exam. We like to take X-rays once a year so that we could just see what is going on and so that we can maintain that level of health that we've achieved.
What is involved during a dental cleaning?
What's involved is that we will always take your vitals, your blood pressure; we want to make sure that your blood pressure is healthy before the appointment starts, because we can often find undetected high blood pressure in our patients. The other thing is that we often just check out the overall health of our patients' gums first. Our hygienists will probe or use this measuring stick to check our patients' gums, and that's a way for our hygienists to explore if there are areas of our patients' gums that are more prone to bleeding. If that's the case, then they are well aware that those bleeding sites are damaged parts of the patient's gums because healthy gums do not bleed at all. So if you think of gums, they're like the skin in the mouth, just like the skin on your hand right here. If I were to scratch or do something to my skin right now, I would not normally expect my skin to bleed because my skin is healthy and intact. However, if I've scraped my hand or got a new cut and I were to rub my skin, then yeah, I can expect some bleeding to go on. That's why when you come in for your hygiene visits, our hygienists usually ask, "Are you experiencing any bleeding during the time of brushing or flossing, or do you just see blood when you spit?" If the answer is yes, then that gives us a clue that there are damaged areas to your gums. When they move on to assessing the different areas of your gums, they will try to make sure to be extra careful because, again, that tells us those parts of your gums that are bleeding from are injured. We want to make sure we give our patients a nice, comfortable experience so that you can proceed to allow us to help you get you healthy.
Does a hygienist dental cleaning usually hurt?
The answer for a majority of visits is no, and that's because if you are doing your regular checkups, then your gums are in a state of health. Again, going back to my analogy, gums are like skin in the mouth, right? If I were to scratch my skin like this, yeah, it scratches, but it doesn't hurt. Now, if I were to scrape my hand or burn my hand and my skin is damaged, then any normal thing that I do, spraying water, scratching it, then would hurt because my skin is damaged. It's the same thing with gums. If gums are in a state of non-health, right, either they're bleeding, they're red, or they're puffy, those are all signs that our gums are not healthy. So we know that here at Sunbrite Dental, and when we see that, we proceed with the dental visit with extra precautions so that we can make it as comfortable as humanly possible for that state of non-health for our patients' gums.
How long does a cleaning usually take?
We usually block out about an hour for each dental hygiene visit. It'll be shorter for kids because they have fewer teeth. If you've been away from the dentist, what I tell patients is to think of your teeth like dishes, right? Right after you eat from those dishes you rinse them right away and you clean them right away, really easy to clean. However, if you just leave those dishes in the sink and let them sit and the food gets crusted on and hard, then when you come back to clean them, it takes a lot longer and a lot more effort to get those same dishes clean. It's the same thing with teeth. When you come in regularly, then cleaning your teeth is a cinch, just like you had decided to clean those dishes right away. But if you've let them sit and they're a little bit dirtier and things have hardened and crusted on, then yeah, it's going to take a little bit longer for us to properly clean all the nooks and crannies from your teeth.
Is it necessary to do anything after a dental cleaning?
The answer is no, and for me, I know it's a mental thing. When I get my teeth cleaned, I feel like I can taste food a lot better, so I love to go eat after I get my teeth cleaned. One thing we do provide, especially for our younger patients, are fluoride treatments. If we were to do a fluoride treatment on you or your little one, then we ask that patient not to drink or eat for the next 30 minutes, and then after that, you can resume life as normal, and if you're like me, go and have something to eat.
I hope I was able to answer some of the questions that have been milling around in your head that maybe you were too afraid to ask. If I didn't tackle any questions, please feel free to reach out to me. You can reach me at (702) 819-0866 or stop by. I'm here at Sunbrite Dental, and you can ask me those questions in person and in private if you need to. So I'll see you guys soon. Good, you can stop the video now.