Dental hygiene is the most effective dental care that you can practice to ensure that you never need extensive dental care. Dental hygiene can entail brushing twice a day and flossing once a day. This can prevent dental caries and the need for extensive dental procedures. There are also recommendations from the American Dental Association for evaluation by a dental hygienist at least twice a year. This is to ensure that there is a formal surveying process to screen for any dental disease as well as oral cancer. Dental hygiene can also help by allowing the dentist to strengthen teeth with fluoride. The dental hygienist can also clean tartar from those hard to reach places and remove plaque that is too hard to be removed by brushing and flossing.
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The dental hygienist has many ways that they can take care of your teeth. Cleaning teeth is the act of removing tartar from those hard to reach places. This is accomplished biannually in order to remove plaque that is otherwise irremovable by manual brushing and flossing. This is then aided with the tooth polishing process that can give your teeth the shine that brushing cannot aid with. The hygienist can then apply ointments to treat your teeth such as fluoride or chlorhexidine washes to aid in the dental healing process. After this is done the dental hygienist can perform a thorough oral cancer screening. The periodontal exam is typically done to assess the status of your gums as well. Your gums are measured to make sure that the gingival ligaments have not been damaged by inflammation and bacterial build up. After all of this is performed the hygienist will take X-rays of your mouth in order to assess for cavities caused by acidic byproducts of bacterial build up. The dentist will then examine the patient's mouth, assess for any further pathology, review the X-rays and prescribe treatments based on the clinical picture.
If you have further questions on dental hygiene feel free to contact our dental associates today |