Personal Dental Hygiene to Keep Teeth Healthy

Unhealthy teeth can lead to multiple health problems. Yet, keeping one’s teeth clean and healthy is easy to maintain with simple personal hygiene habits. The simplest hygiene habit to maintain is brushing the teeth. A toothbrush is readily available at a retail store for as little as a dollar and up to a few dollars. Regular cleaning of the teeth will help save the teeth from infections and cavities. The primary goal of brushing teeth is to remove food particles that lodge between the teeth. To clean the teeth using a toothbrush hold the brush at a comfortable angle in the mouth, being careful to ensure that as much of the toothbrush bristles are touching the teeth while applying short back and forth strokes as though scrubbing the tooth. 

Cleaning Different Teeth 

Always pay special attention when cleaning the different types of teeth. On the innermost part of the jaw near the throat, the mouth has three molars. The third, which is also the last tooth in the mouth, is the largest while the one in the middle is medium and the first one is the smallest. After the molars come two bicuspids and have a similar look like the molars. The molars and the bicuspids have a groove at the middle. It is important to ensure that you scrub this groove thoroughly to remove any particles that may lodge inside. 

After the bicuspids is the cuspid tooth. It is one tooth and it has a sharp edge. In vampire illustrations, this tooth is shown as an elongated fang. The cuspid teeth tend to host food on the underside. It is therefore important to scrub the inner part of the mouth to ensure that that surface is completely clean. Always ensure that you take time to clean all the three surfaces of each tooth thoroughly to get a particle free mouth. Once done with the teeth, use the bristles of the toothbrush to scrub the tongue and ensure the white coating comes off. This cleaning, especially with toothpaste, leaves your mouth smelling fresh and it becomes unfriendly to cavity causing germs. 

The Danger of Irregular Personal Dental Hygiene 

Another common teeth-cleaning habit is flossing. Dental floss is also widely available from retail shops. Some people have teeth that fit tightly against each other. For these, flossing is not always necessary. However, routine flossing every six months done by a D.D.S (Doctor of Dental Surgery) removes any lodged food particles. The danger of food particles that remain in the mouth for too long is that the bacteria in the teeth create an acidity leading to toothache, cavities, and possible infections. Once cavities start in the mouth, besides a toothache, one requires periodontal therapy to repair the damaged teeth. Infections can also spread to the gums causing periodontal disease (gum disease). 

Dental hygienists treat damaged teeth in several ways. Using sealants, fillings, and crowns, they cover the tooth and restore the ability to chew with it. When too damaged, the dentist extracts the tooth. Tooth extractions leave one with a gaping hole in the mouth, but the dentist can cover the gap with dentures. Some dentures look very much like the original teeth. For this reason, dentures and veneers are common in cosmetic dental surgery and in fluoride treatment. When you visit your dentist, they will advise on which of the therapies will work best for your dental condition. 

A Brief Description of Dental Hygiene

Dental hygienists are doctors who have studied dental work. Most dentists do specialized training to become a D.D.S (Doctor of Dental Surgery) qualifying them to carry out dental work. The mouth has a four types of teeth and each has specific roles. The four teeth in the front of the mouth are incisors and they are the scissors of the mouth as they cut through food. These are followed by cuspids, a single tooth on either side of the mouth that is critical to tearing through food. Two bicuspids that have a ridge in the middle follow. They are important in helping us chew our food. We crush solid and harder foods with the molars. These three teeth are at the extreme back of the mouth. 

Dental Hygiene Habits and Common Dental Conditions  

Taking care of the teeth is simple. A daily habit of brushing the teeth after a meal keeps the mouth free of food particles that would play host to disease causing bacteria. People with teeth that are slightly apart tend to have food particles stick between the teeth. Flossing is a good habit to clean out those food particles and keep the mouth clean. 

It is important to keep the mouth clean to avoid common problems with the teeth and in the mouth. Daily brushing can keep the teeth from developing cavities or holes in the enamel of the teeth. Periodontal disease, or gum disease, is another painful condition resulting from poor dental hygiene. When food particles are not removed after every meal through brushing of the teeth, bacteria in the mouth causes infections that affect the gum. Gum disease makes the gums bleed, is painful, and when left untreated, causes the teeth to fall out. 

Common Dental Procedures

Some dental procedures treat dental conditions, others are cosmetic, while yet others serve both roles. Brown teeth, or fluorosis, is a common tooth condition that occurs when a person takes in excess fluoride. To correct the discoloration or fluorosis, a dentist performs fluoride treatment and may cover the teeth with veneer to restore the white coloring. Putting veneers on the teeth can also be done for cosmetic reasons to give the teeth extra whitening. 

Periodontal therapy covers many aspects of dentistry including procedures done to correct diseases and conditions in the mouth. When a tooth develops a cavity, a dentist may cover the tooth with sealants or crowns or fill the hole with fillings. This stops the cavity from extending further, and stops the pain caused by the exposed nerves in the tooth. Most dentists prefer to fill cavities and it is usually possible if one seeks medical help as soon as they develop a tooth ache. However, if the tooth decay is too extensive a filling cannot reverse the damage. In such instances, the dentists performs root canals to remove the nerves in the tooth and stop the pain. 

Sometimes when neither a filling nor a root canal can solve the tooth problem, dentists perform dental extractions and remove the tooth completely from its root. Dental extractions are final and leave a gaping hole where the tooth once was. The gap is unpleasant to look at, and is uncomfortable too. To solve that, dentists will give dentures, which are artificial teeth that look very similar to real teeth.